


Mind & Soul

by cowboykylux



Series: Mind & Soul 'Verse [2]
Category: Marriage Story (2019)
Genre: Affairs, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Divorce, During Canon, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, Extramarital Affairs, F/M, Infidelity, Shameless Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2020-11-02 08:19:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 62,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20681507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cowboykylux/pseuds/cowboykylux
Summary: The story of how one man fell out of love and into it again.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I wanted to get this fic out and posted because I was just so inspired by the trailer for Marriage Story and the sort of potential this terribly angsty film presented! If you're reading this after the film has come out, I'm sorry if anything is really OOC lol <33

_I’ve never been in love before_

_Now all at once it’s you_

_It’s you forever more_

Charlie looks around the theater, hands in his pockets.

The last of the crew had gone, the light and sound booths all locked up. The costumes were zipped in their dust-bags and the props were arranged perfectly on the space they’ve created for this production. The cast had departed long before, all gone off to their homes and their families. Charlie had made excuses all evening to stay, he was so particular, everyone knew him as being particular.

But he couldn’t ask anyone to stay any later, so they have all gone.

It’s just Charlie and the ghosts now, in the theater.

He sighs, scrubs a hand down his face, checks his watch. It’s almost midnight, and he sighs again.

He climbs the short stairs at the front of the stage, faces the empty theater, faces the rows and rows of red velvet seats, tries to imagine a crowd, tries to imagine an audience for his pain. As he stands there, lost in his thoughts, he wonders how it happened, how it got like this.

He knows, who is he kidding? He knows.

It’s been on track to end this way for a long time, he thinks, really thinks about it. The marriage. He can’t help but recoil at the thought, at the way the word stings the back of his throat. It doesn’t matter, he reasons, there’s no one here to see him breakdown – not that he’s breaking down.

He could, if he wanted. No one is there to see.

He could go home, slip right through the front door, right up the stairs to bed. Nicole wouldn’t be awake, she’s never awake. She’s either asleep or gone, has been for the past year.

Has it already been a year? Charlie can’t believe it, but then again, yes he can.

Maybe he won’t go home, he decides, as he paces the stage. He justifies it with the time; it’s so late, really too late to want to take the subway all the way home, too late to want to deal with a taxi or an Uber or whatever the hell. He doesn’t know why he bothers justifying it at all, Nicole won’t ask him. She doesn’t ask him things anymore, no more ‘_how are you_’s or ‘_how was your day’_s. It suits him just fine, he wouldn’t be able to answer without lying.

He doesn’t like lying.

He sighs again, lays down on the couch on the stage. It’s an antique, matches the feeling of the play well, or at least that’s what he thought. It’s really fucking uncomfortable, and he can’t help but huff a self-deprecating laugh at the thought that it’s somehow still more comfortable then his bed at home.

It started out well enough, Charlie thinks, an actress and a director. That made sense, didn’t it? Started out with smiles and laughter and kisses late at night, kisses at school, on stage. He wonders why he gave everything up for Nicole, kicks himself for doing it. So many experiences to have and people and places to see and go, and he settled down with her.

Now look at him.

He stares up at the rafters, and his stomach twists and swoops, as he thinks of you.

You had changed everything, because of course you had. Of course you had.

He thinks about the curve of your face and the soft plushness of your lips when they press against his. As he lays there, stares up at the rafters of the stage he distracts the bitter thoughts of Nicole with the calming thoughts of you, the way your legs wrap around his hips, the way he bends you over with ease. The way you come on his cock his fingers his tongue, the way you laugh and tease and bully him in the most playful way that only you can get away with.

He loves you, had loved you long before he even really met you, he thinks.

He thinks back to the first time, that first day.

_I’ve never been in love before_

_I thought my heart was safe_

_I thought I knew the score_

_But this is wine_

_It’s all too strange and strong_

_I’m full of foolish song_

_And out my song must pour_

It had been a sunny day, an exciting day. Henry had just turned seven, and they made the decision to move into a bigger house, more room for Henry to run around and play with his friends, room for maybe a dog, maybe two. They were living the cookie-cutter dream, complete with white picket fence and tire swing hanging from the great big tree on the front lawn.

They thought maybe that was the root of all the arguments, maybe there just hadn’t been enough space at the apartment. So Charlie bought them the house, moved them in, hoped the arguments would stop.

He feels like a fucking moron for that, now.

But then, then they were so excited.

The house was just outside the city, just barely a suburb. It was close enough that they could walk to the train station, could drop Henry off at school before going their separate ways – Charlie to rehearsal in one theater, Nicole to rehearsal in another.

At least, that’s what they told each other. As time went on, who the fuck knew where they went.

Charlie knew.

The moving truck got there at exactly eight in the morning, and you had knocked on their door at nine.

Looking back, Charlie can remember exactly what you wore, exactly how you looked as you stood on the front stoop. The sun kissed your skin, made your hair practically glow. It made Charlie’s hands sweat, but he wrote it off as just being from the heat of the day.

Nicole was busy unpacking some boxes, so it was Charlie who had opened the door, opened it to your smiling welcoming face. He didn’t think he had ever seen anyone so beautiful, but at the time, he pushed the thought away.

Now he was thinking about it all the time.

“Hi! I hope I’m not bothering you,” You shifted the foil wrapped tray in your arms to free a hand, extend it out for him to shake. “I’m (Y/N), your next door neighbor. I just wanted to welcome you to the block.”

Charlie can remember feeling your hand in his for the first time, the firmness of your grip despite how small your hand was compared to his own. He remembers forgetting to let go, the handshake awkwardly long, only the reminder of his wife making him drop it.

“Honey who is it?” Nicole had shouted from one of the bedrooms, and without turning to look away from you, he answered.

“Our new neighbor!” he shouted back, gratefully taking the tray from your hands. 

It smelled delicious, whatever it was, like fruit and syrup and pastry. It smelled like home, like a new beginning.

And it was, just not the kind Charlie thought he was getting.

“It’s pie.” You told him, so he wouldn’t have to lift the foil, and you smile.

“She made us a pie.” He shouts again, smiling back. No one had ever made him a pie before.

Nicole made herself present then, and you had smiled at her just as brightly, had offered your hand to shake hers as well. She dusted her own hands off on her jeans before taking yours, was surprised by your grip too. You didn’t shy away from Nicole, you never have.

“That’s so sweet, thank you. I’m Nicole, this is my husband Charlie.” She said, thinking nothing of it.

The memory stings, the way she had been so happy to call him hers back then.

He wonders if she thinks about it too, about the farce that they had been living.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ll leave you guys be, but I work from home so if you have any questions about the neighborhood or anything, feel free to ring my bell.” You had said, not wanting to overstep any boundaries. 

“Thank you, we will.” Charlie had said, right before Nicole had closed the door in your face.

He remembers the argument that they had later, about how Charlie thought that was rude, about how Nicole didn’t trust the pie coming from some stranger.

You didn’t feel like a stranger, not to Charlie.

_So please forgive_

_This helpless haze I’m in_

_I’ve really never been_

_In love before_

He wishes he could go back in time, divorce Nicole right then and there, right after she had slammed the door. It would have saved everyone a whole lot of fucking trouble, he thinks.

But he can’t, he can’t go back in time.

So instead he takes advantage of the present, he takes advantage of your patience. You’re so patient with him, always have been. You don’t expect anything from him, not the way everyone else does. You’re a steady rock in this tumultuous fucking divorce, this nasty fucking divorce.

Your patience is the only thing that keeps him from completely losing it, sometimes, when Nicole is in LA and Henry is with her and he can feel control slipping through the cracks between his fingers. Loose sand in the desert.

No one knew, no one could know, about the two of you.

It made him ashamed, made him feel like he was the scum of the earth for having to sneak around and be with you the way he did. He wanted you on his arm, wanted to show you off for the whole world to see.

But he can’t, not yet. Not until the last of the ink dries and they part ways for the last time, not until it’s officially official, that he’s no longer a married man.

He hasn’t felt like a married man in a long time, in years.

He wonders what he’ll do when he’s free, finally free. He smiles to himself, he knows what he’s going to do.

He’s known for years.

“This seat taken?” You ask, startling him awake.

He doesn’t realize he had fallen asleep, doesn’t realize he’s lying on the prop couch on stage, and his eyes blink into the darkness of the theater as he sits up, eyes adjust to the soft glow of the gentle stage lights he had dimmed.

You look like an angel, backlit by the lights as you climb the front steps. Just seeing you throws his heart into an erratic rhythm that has him sweating, not with fear but with hunger, a quiet desperation.

“What are you doing here?” He asks, voice thick with sleep.

Your eyes glance downwards, and you kneel in front of him. Charlie’s pulse quickens at the sight of you on your knees, as you rest your head on his thigh. He brings his hand to your hair, pets it back sweetly.

It’s the first tender touch he’s had in days, a stolen moment in an empty theater.

“I asked you first.” You whisper, sighing into his lap, a hand lightly stroking his calf. “It’s late.” You say, just to have something to say, just to talk to him.

You don’t get to talk to him very often, not like this. Don’t get to be close, not like this.

“Yeah, it is.” Charlie swallows, pets your hair.

“Is everything okay?” You ask, and he doesn’t know how to respond.

He doesn’t know, because he doesn’t know. Nicole won’t talk to him, won’t tell him anything. She says she feels oppressed, calls him selfish – but for what? That he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know how to fix things, not that he wants to.

He doesn’t want to.

Maybe he is selfish, for not wanting to.

You’re waiting for an answer, waiting for something, because that’s how conversations work. One person says something, and another person responds. He’s read enough scripts to know, directed enough plays.

You’re waiting, but he doesn’t have a good answer to give. There’s no such thing as good dialogue, he thinks. Someone once said there are no conversations, only intersecting monologues.

“Honestly, no not really.” Charlie says, looks down into your sad eyes, “But things are better now, now that you’re here.”

It’s the truth, and he doesn’t deny it, doesn’t want to.

He doesn’t deny it.

You lick your lips and Charlie pulls you up off the dusty stage floor, pulls you fully into his lap. Bits of nothing catch the light and swirl around in the air as he arranges you so you straddle his thighs, lets his hands span your back as he kisses you.

You kiss back, slowly, tentatively. It’s wrong, you both know it’s wrong, but he can’t help but think it’s the best thing he’s ever done, kissing you.

It’s quiet in the empty theater, so quiet that your moans and your pants and his groans and his grunts rise up to the rafters, cling to the beams there for the ghosts of plays gone by to drink up. Your secret is safe there, with the ghosts, with the theater, and he kisses you, lets a hand drop between your bodies to dip under your long skirt. He swallows hard when he feels how wet you are for him, how you’re starting to soak through your panties.

“I don’t like this, Charlie.” You say against his lips like you’re in pain, and his hand freezes, terrified he’s upset you.

“Don’t like what?” He asks, already withdrawing himself, kicking himself for thinking –

But then you’re shaking your head, grabbing his hand and sliding it between your underwear and your skin, and he can almost see the wet shine of tears in your eyes as you nudge his hand between your lips.

“You being here, by yourself. Afraid to go home.” You moan and sigh as Charlie moves his fingers, as he thrusts them inside you slowly, so slowly, dragging his fingertips against your walls, rubbing lazy circles on your clit, “You have to go home.”

You say it, say it because you have to. Because otherwise you’re a bad person, condoning this.

You want this so desperately.

“I’m not afraid – I don’t…It doesn’t feel like home, anymore.” Charlie licks into your mouth, frustrated and hard in his pants, and terrified and in love all at the same time. In love with someone who isn’t his wife, “I’m so sick of the silence, and that’s all that ever happens there anymore.” He tries to explain, tries to talk about the coldness that the house has now.

He swallows your moans down, his hot mouth on yours, drunk on the wine of your tongue.

“Well I won’t let you sleep here.” You say, so practical. He loves you, loves how practical you are.

“I’m too tired to take a cab.” He groans, and you laugh just a little.

“Then let’s walk.” You get up, and he groans at the loss of your heat around his fingers. “There’s a hotel just across the street. Come on, you can’t sleep here, Charlie.”

Charlie looks up at you, backlit by those lights, soft blue light flooding the stage.

“Would you stay?” He asks, his hand holding onto the back of your thigh, your skirt bunched up around his wrist. “Stay with me?”

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” You bite your lip.

It could be bad, could be bad to be seen walking in together, walking out together in the morning. Someone might see, someone who knew you. Someone might see, and they’d know.

Charlie knows this too.

“I think it’s the best idea I’ve had in a long time.” He says anyway, because it’s true, always wants to tell the truth around you. No one listens to his truth, anymore. “I’m tired of not being able to hold you. Let me hold you?”

“I…” You have to look up to the ceiling, look up to those rafters and meet the eyes of the ghosts, the ones who are just as sad as you are, you know they are.

You can’t see them, but you know they’re there, you know they see.

“What’s wrong?” Charlie asks, stands up from the couch, and then it’s his eyes you’re looking into, ghosts long forgotten.

“I’ll let you do a lot more than hold me. I’d let you do so much more than just hold me, if I thought we could get away with it. But we can’t, you know we can’t.” You voice your fear, so afraid of ruining things for him.

“What does it matter? She’s leaving me anyway, doesn’t want to be with me anyway.” He explains, and he hates her, hates Nicole in this moment, for making everything so fucking difficult. He knows that’s not fair, but, “I don’t want to be with her, I want to stay with you. Stay with me?”

“Oh, Charlie.” You look up at him, close the short distance between you with a kiss, as the two of you let yourselves have something for once.

Even if it’s just for this once.

_But this is wine_

_It’s all too strange and strong_

_I’m full of foolish song_

_And out my song must pour_

When he fucks you in the hotel, it’s more like making love.

It’s the slow undulation of his hips and your breathy moans that are tinged with tenderness, sweetness, softness. He could cry if he had the tears, he could. Instead he grunts and groans, mouth hanging open because the feeling of your cunt around him is so overwhelming.

“You’re so good, so perfect.” He sighs, litters your skin with kisses and bites and nips and sucks, and you grin underneath him, completely enveloped in him, in his arms.

“Right there – please Charlie right there.” You arch your back and tip your chin up, naked body sliding on the cool sheets of the freshly made bed.

In the morning they will come and take these sheets away, wash away the evidence of his betrayal, of your corruption, if that’s what they want to call it. Charlie doesn’t feel corrupted in the slightest, the only fire and brimstone of adultery he feels is that of the rush in his veins when he draws out the sweetest softest whines from you.

His hands span the distance of your breasts and he doesn’t stop himself from squeezing, kneading them. They’re so perfect, fit his hands perfectly. You’re made for him, he thinks, and you think it too, the both of you gasping into each other’s mouths.

You’re strung out underneath him, and he takes his time with you. Time seems to stand still when you’re there, he thinks, the whole universe stands still, and in that moment there’s no one else in the whole world, but you and him.

“Make me come?” You ask, ask him so sweetly, and how can he deny you that?

He’s got your legs arranged all around him, picks one up and gently places it over his shoulder, kisses the ankle there as he fucks you deeper, watches as your face and chest flush as you come with tightly shut eyes.

“Charlie!” You gasp, eyelids fluttering.

He’s not far behind, but he’s still got a ways to go, condom tight on his cock and keeping his own orgasm at bay. He wishes he didn’t have to, doesn’t want to wear one, but he’s not a jackass. He wants to keep you both safe. If it means he gets to fuck you a little longer, then he thinks it’s not so bad a tradeoff. 

You pull him down so he’s practically flush against you, loop your arms around him.

He savors the feeling of you clenching around him, of you sucking on his neck, hot breath and moans and whines low in his ear. He knows it’s starting to get to be too much for you, you’re oversensitive and overwhelmed, and he grinds his cock into you deep, coming when you worry his earlobe in between those perfect teeth of yours.

He comes with a shout, and makes you come again, pushes another orgasm out of you by dropping his hand to roll your clit around lazily. He wishes he could feel your come mixing with his, wishes he could feel coated in your slick.

It’s too risky, you both know that.

At least for a little while, it’s still too risky.

“Thank you.” You hum happily, and Charlie stays inside you, keeps you pressed tight to him, kisses the underside of your jaw.

He doesn’t know how you can thank him, when you’re the benevolent one.

He doesn’t know.

He kisses you.

_So please forgive_

_This helpless haze I’m in_

_I’ve really never been_

_In love before_


	2. Chapter 2

_I'm A Fool To Want You_

_I'm A Fool To Want You_

_To Want A Love That Can't Be True_

_A Love That's There_

_For Others Too_

He can tell that he’s dreaming, somehow. In that way that you know you’re not awake because everything is far too floaty, intangible. He knows, because he’s at the house, just walking through the door. He’s got a briefcase in one hand, and his coat draped over his arm. He can’t remember the last time he did that in real life, so this must be a dream.

He knows what dream this is. It’s a memory.

He knows because Nicole is sitting on the couch when he comes through the door, he knows because he remembers how tired she looked, her eyes rimmed red from crying. He hasn’t seen her cry in a long time, but he remembers this.

“Charlie.” Nicole says, and it stuns him.

He feels the fresh hurt from the dream and the familiar hurt from the memory at the same time, like he’s two people trapped in one, memory-Charlie and present-day Charlie. He knows what’s coming but he can’t stop it from happening.

He doesn’t want to.

“Oh.” He hears himself say, “You remember my name.”

And in hindsight that’s a shitty thing to say, it’s just another reason, he knows that now. But at the time he hadn’t cared. He’s still not sure he cares.

“I’m leaving you.” Nicole takes a deep breath but when she speaks it’s resolute. When she speaks it’s with a finality she never had before. Charlie doesn’t believe it, even though really, deep down, he knew this was coming.

He knew, of course he knew.

“What do you mean?” He asks anyway, because he needs to hear it. Memory-Charlie needs to hear it.

Present-Charlie has heard it enough.

Nicole stands then, she paces the room for a moment before coming to stand right in the center of it, like she’s on stage. She has a monologue, a script she’s concocted just for this. Charlie’s heard it a thousand times in these dreams, but each time it feels less and less real, each time it makes his blood boil more and more.

“I mean I’m leaving you, Charlie. I can’t live here anymore – I won’t do it. These past nine years have been hell, they’ve been torture. You cannot change my mind, and I don’t want you to try. I don’t want to live in New York anymore and I haven’t for a while. I’m doing something for myself for once, and I’m leaving you. I paid the bills from the checking account and canceled my credit cards, and I have an apartment in Los Angeles where I’m flying tonight.”

She’s staring at him hard, and he doesn’t know when the hot tears started to sting his eyes, but he can feel them now, feels them slip just past his tear-ducts and onto his cheek.

“No you’re not.” He hears himself say, but even then he knows how hollow it is, how empty.

“My keys are in the dish by the door and the bags are packed.” Nicole replies, and he can feel the familiar spike of panic deep in his chest, it’s enough to almost wake him, enough to almost have him bolting upright, but the dream’s got too tight of a hold on him, and he wonders if he can get sick in a memory.

“Whose bags?” He asks, and even then, time seems to stand still.

It’s frozen when she looks away from him – a coward.

“My bags.” She says, whispers, too soft he almost can’t hear it, “Just my bags.”

And the realization of that hits him like a ton of bricks, it hits him like a running train, like he’s just slammed into one of Wile E. Coyote’s painted murals.

She’s leaving him, yes, but it’s not just him she’s leaving.

They stare at one another, and Charlie has to sit down, afraid his legs are going to give out on him, suddenly terrified, and impossibly angry.

“What did you tell him?” He asks, and this is the part that Charlie hates the most, from the memory.

This is the part that has him and his lawyers all in a fucking uproar, this is the part where he realizes he has no idea who the fuck he married, no idea who he spent so much fucking time with. This is where he looks his wife in the eyes and she looks back up and him and with the cold hard stare of a woman who no longer has love in her heart says:

“Nothing.”

And he nods, then, nods because of course she didn’t, of course. That’s so on brand, just like her, to not want to say anything, to want to vanish without a trace.

And she calls him selfish?

“What am I going to tell him when he wakes up and asks where you are?” He asks, because all he’s left with is questions, the who what when where – why? Why why why?

Nicole is already walking out of the living room then, into the bedroom where she reappears with her suitcase in hand. She doesn’t look like she’s crying anymore, doesn’t look like she’s anything. She’s leaving.

“You’re a smart man, Charlie. You’ll figure something out.” She says as she brushes past him, and he panics, chases after her.

“Okay no, no you don’t get to do this. You don’t get to fucking do this!” He shouts, getting red in the face and crying fully now, crying because he can’t do anything else. “Get back here – god damn it Nicole you do not get to just walk away from this like you do with everything else! You don’t get to fucking do that!”

He’s yelling, and he knows he’s being loud, and even then he’s wincing, but he can’t just sit idly by while he watches this woman ruin his life, ruin their son’s life.

“I am sick and fucking tired of you telling me what I can and can’t do. I’m tired of it, Charlie!” Nicole says, and Charlie laughs.

He knows now that was shitty too, he knows. But still, he laughs, spreads his arms wide.

“I don’t give a shit! I don’t care if you’re tired, I don’t care.” He watches a taxi pull up, and suddenly he feels very cold, he feels like a bucket of ice has been dumped down his back. “You cannot leave your son like this, like a coward in the middle of the night. You don’t get to.”

“Well I am.” She says as she gets into the back of the cab.

When she slams the door shut, he wakes up.

_I'm A Fool To Hold You_

_Such A Fool To Hold You_

_To Seek A Kiss Not Mine Alone_

_To Share A Kiss The Devil Has Known_

It takes him a minute to realize where he is, once he’s awake. He’s startled, blinking against the white light that comes in through the sheer curtains on the windows. They’re not any curtains he recognizes, except then he does, and when he does he sighs with relief enough to wake you up.

He thanks whatever powers there might be, that it’s you he wakes up to.

You stretch and make soft noises in the back of your throat as your eyes shut tight against the light that he’s basking in, hum out a happy sound when he lets his hand smooth against your shoulder.

“Good morning.” You say, mumble, mostly into his chest. He likes that you do that, that you press a kiss to his heart on the mornings you get to spend together.

“We have to leave soon.” He says back, but he says it with a smile.

You’re too understanding, he thinks, when you smile back.

“Alright, I’ll go first?” You ask, before sitting up and settling across him, straddling him.

You’re so incredibly beautiful, he thinks, skin warm and soft with your hair looking a hot mess from sleep, knotted and tangled from his own fingers.

“We can go together.” Charlie says, hands sliding up your body to hold your tits, give them a playful squeeze.

You laugh just a little, lean down to kiss him, and before you know it he’s got his arms around you, holding you tight. He can feel your sad sigh, and it kills him.

“I wish I could go with you, today.” You murmur, a harsh reminder of the hearing later that day.

They’re starting the custody battle now. Everything else has been settled, the properties, the finances. Everything has been settled except for Henry. Charlie isn’t going to give him up, and Nicole is suing him for that.

As if she has any claim on him.

Everything has been so fucking nasty, and he knows that this is going to be no different. He knows.

“No, I don’t want you to hear the shit we say.” He says, and you nod, you understand.

Charlie will tell you anyway later, he knows he will. But there’s something too painful about you hearing it all firsthand, he wants to spare you that.

“Where’s Henry?” You ask, and he pets your hair back with a groan.

“With Nicole’s mom.” He replies, and he knows that you know that that’s shitty.

“Hmm.” Is all you say, and he sighs.

“I fucking hate it – she keeps looking at me like I’m losing. Like I’m going to lose him.” He clenches his jaw, can feel his chin wobbling, and you can feel it too, can feel how he’s gearing up for a meltdown, a breakdown. He’s not breaking down. Not yet.

“You won’t.” You pull back just enough to look him in the eye, and there’s something in the way that you’re so sure of it, that makes him laugh wetly.

“I know. I can’t.” He says, heart thudding deep in his chest when he admits for the first time, “He’s all I’ve got.”

“Charlie.” Your brow pinches in, and he hates it.

He hates her, for doing this to him, for doing this to everyone.

He knows he’s wrong for it, but that’s how he feels.

“I don’t have family, the way Nicole does. Henry’s all I’ve got.” He tries to explain – but how can he?

How can he explain how lonely he has always been, how Henry has been the one thing he can confidently say he did right? The one thing he’s been most proud of in his life? How can he explain to anyone, if he can’t even explain it to himself.

He doesn’t speak to his parents, doesn’t have brothers or sisters or aunts or uncles. He’s got no one, if he doesn’t have his son.

“You’ve got me.” You say, just like a mind-reader, because he’s convinced you are.

He looks at you then, and he’s terrified you’re lying to him, even though you’ve never lied to him before.

“Do I?” He asks, has to know. Even after a year of fucking you, of making love to you, after a year of stolen kisses and borrowed time, he has to know.

“Yeah, you do.” You cup his face, stare into his eyes deeply, and he swallows around the hard lump that forms there.

He kisses you, because he can, because no one will see you here, no one will see how he clings to you so desperately. No one but the pigeons that sit on the balcony railing just outside the hotel room, no one but the sun and the clouds and the reflection in the mirror across from the bed. He puts everything he has into that kiss, everything he can muster, to tell you that you have him too.

“I don’t want to leave.” He says, and he doesn’t, wishes he could stay wrapped up in those sheets, in that bubble with you forever.

“Me neither.” You reply, tuck his hair behind his ears, let yourself be manhandled underneath him, let your hands wander down down down his body, “But it’s almost nine.”

He looks at the digital alarm clock near the lamp on the side table, looks back at you.

“Check-out’s at eleven.” He says, and you grin, nod, open yourself for him.

_Time And Time Again I Said I'd Leave You_

_Time And Time Again I Went Away_

_Then There'd Come The Time When I Would Need You_

_And Once Again These Words I'd Have To Say_

Hours later he finds himself at the courthouse, walking through the door the same way he did in that dream, in that memory – briefcase in one hand, coat draped over his arm. Except this time it’s not to tell his wife that he’s just sold a big play, it’s to look her in the eyes and tell her she’s unfit to care for their child.

What a fucking trip.

She’s sitting there, on the plaintiff’s side, because she’s the one doing this to him, always has been. She’s always been the one fucking him over, screwing up his life, but refuses to admit it. She’s sitting there and he hates her, the way her hair is shorter than it was, how she put on a nice pant-suit to appear put together. Hates how hard he’s going to have to fight to prove that she isn’t.

She’s sitting there and he walks past her and he figures the least he can do is say hello. It’s more than she would ever do for him, he knows that now.

“Nicole.” He greets her, and she recoils as though she’s been slapped.

“Don’t talk to me.” She frowns, like that’s some given, like he’s violated some unspoken one-sided rule.

Nicole had a lot of those, he’s come to find.

“Can’t we at least be civil?” He asks, voice flat, low.

“No, we can’t.” She says, affronted, offended.

“Why not?” Charlie has to ask, because really, they’re in a courthouse – if there’s any place to be civil, it’s here.

But Nicole is having none of it, and the way she folds her arms across her chest and huffs in her seat makes Charlie grind his teeth together.

“Because fuck you, Charlie. That’s why.” She says soft enough that only he can hear, and he has to laugh to himself, just has to laugh.

“This is exactly the kind of shit I’m talking about, Nicole. This is exactly it.” He shakes his head, scratches the side of his nose as he walks past her to his side of the courtroom, empty save for them, lawyers chatting outside.

“What?” Nicole asks with such thick sarcasm that he almost doesn’t want to answer, but he does anyway, because one of them has to be decent, he figures.

He knows he’s not, not with the way he runs around with you, but he feels more decent than she does right now, and that’s what matters.

“You’re a spoiled brat who breezes through life thinking she can just do or say or act however she wants.” He puts it as simply as he can, and Nicole’s eyebrows shoot up for a moment before they settle into a deep frown.

“You want to say that in front of the judge?” She asks, and he sucks his teeth, leg bouncing.

“Oh believe me, I will. Just maybe not in so many words.” He replies, and he can see the fear in her eyes, that maybe he’ll fuck her over for once.

“You wouldn’t dare.” She mutters, and he shrugs, filled with nothing but contempt for her now.

“You have no idea what I would do, to protect my son.” He says, not sure if it’s a threat or a promise. He’s not sure.

_I'm A Fool To Want You_

_Pity Me I Need You_

_I Know Its Wrong_

_It Must Be Wrong_

_But Right Or Wrong_

_I Can't Get Along Without You_

_Time And Time Again I Said I'd Leave You_

_Time And Time Again I Went Away_

_Then There'd Come The Time When I Would Need You_

_And Once Again These Words I'd Have To Say_

You have his number saved as something else, something inconspicuous, something no one would recognize as being him if they were to see it. It’s a different number, a new number, a number he got just for you.

“Just for us.” He said once upon a time, when he offered you a scrap of napkin in a crowded coffee shop with this secret scrawled on it in ballpoint pen.

It’s texting at first, because that’s easier than calling, it’s less of a risk, less of a chance someone might overhear. Your pulse jumps in your throat whenever you see one come through, eager to respond. You’re not in the mood to play hard to get, not with a man who you wanted so desperately, who was already impossible to have.

Impossible, but you take him anyway.

**I hate lawyers. I’m thinking about you. Do you think about me too?** He asks, always so serious – full sentences, which surprises you.

With how much he works, you’d think it’d all be shorthand. And maybe it is, but he likes to take his time with you, he’s serious about you.

You’re serious too.

**I’m always thinking about you.** You tell him back, because it’s true, and it’s lightning quick when he responds.

**Show me?**

And you do, tap the little yellow ghost, contort yourself to show off your curves, your angles. You know he’s waiting for it, know he’s tucked away in a corner somewhere – probably somewhere in the courthouse where he just finished arguing and proving his case for what feels like the hundredth time – with his hand down his pants, hungry for the snaps you send him, for any hint of your skin.

He can’t keep them, as much as he wants to, has to let them disappear. He hates it, but he knows you’ll send him more. He sends you some back, tries to make them appealing, but mostly fails. Charlie doesn’t care much about angles, doesn’t care much for the performance of it all. He’s had too much of that in his life, performance.

He’s never had too much of you, though.

He calls you, then.

“You’re so fucking pretty.” He moans, already breathy, “Thank you.”

He always thanks you, like this is some great gift you’re bestowing upon him, and your blood boils that he has to ask at all, that she holds back from him all the fucking time.

“I miss you, miss your hands on me.” You say, voice low, rolling over in your bed.

It’s the middle of the day, a stolen nap interrupted. You didn’t mind much.

“Touch yourself? Don’t let me be alone.” Charlie pleads, and you’re eager to do what he says, what he wants.

You let your hand fall down between your legs, let yourself moan into your phone. You put it on speaker, have it propped up on your stomach so your other hand can clasp around your throat, so you can pretend it’s his for a while.

He curses lowly, and if you listen carefully you can hear the sound of fabric rustling, can hear the way he’s breathing in short pants as he gets himself off to the sound of you. It’s echoey, like he’s in a bathroom, or a stairwell, you can’t tell.

It doesn’t matter, you gasp for him, spur him on.

“You could come over, come see me.” You suggest, eyes shut tight as you picture him really above you, his fingers thrusting in and out of your pussy instead of your own. Yours aren’t as satisfying as his are, you need him.

“Fuck – okay, okay I will.” He surprises you, making you still for a moment.

“You will?” You ask seriously, eyes opening and staring up at the ceiling in your empty bedroom, wishing it was that little hotel room instead.

“Of course, all you have to do is ask.” Charlie says, and suddenly he’s serious too, and you wonder where he is, what he’s staring at.

“Don’t say that.” You moan, your fingers toying with your clit, resuming their work to get you worked up up up, eyes shutting again.

“Why not?” He demands, like he’s pained, like he’s angry, and you can’t help but smile, whine into the phone.

“Because I’ll ask every day.” You’re getting close, but you mean it, and he moans lowly when he knows you mean it too.

“Then I’ll come every day.” He says, and you yelp against your own touch, and you can hear him grunting, wish that you could be the one to touch him, to have him touch you, touching together forever.

“You’ll come? Please Charlie, please tell me you’ll come.” You beg, voice high, loud, not caring anymore – it’s not like anyone can hear, no one can hear. You’re safe within these four walls, and soon you’ll be safe together.

“Yeah, I’ll come.” Charlie grits his teeth as he does, has to block it with his palm, has to thunk his head back against the wall of the stairwell, has to try his damnest not to make too much noise, knowing how it would echo up up up the walls, out into the lobby of the courthouse where too many people are completely oblivious to him, to you.

You can hear his breathing on the other line, hear the way it gets crushed through the receiver. He must not be in a place with great signal.

But that’s okay because soon, soon he’ll be with you, and he won’t need his phone at all.

_I'm A Fool To Want You_

_Pity Me I Need You_

_I Know Its Wrong_

_It Must Be Wrong_

_But Right Or Wrong_

_I Can't Get Along Without You_


	3. Chapter 3

_The thrill is gone_   
_The thrill is gone_   
_I can see it in your eyes_   
_I can hear it in your sighs_   
_Feel your touch and realize_   
_The thrill is gone_

A month ago, the divorce proceedings had started.

Which Charlie thought was kind of messed up, considering Nicole had left him six months prior to that.

Six months out in Los Angeles fucking California, six months playing actress in shitty independent theater productions, six months getting tanned and bleached blonde and and and.

And now she is back, and it’s been a month, and Charlie hates every second of it, just wants it to be over with. The divorce proceedings had been easy, dividing up the stuff, cutting all ties. He had never been so happy, to cut all the ties. 

They would sell the house, split the profit 50/50 and all the shit inside it. There had been a prenup, signed and notarized so money wasn’t a concern, and Charlie thanks his lucky fucking stars he had had the foresight to do that, because he knew – somehow he just knew – that Nicole would try and milk him for every penny he had otherwise.

The only thing left was custody.

And that…that had been the big pain in his fucking ass, the thorn in his side, the elephant in the room.

Because after six months of fucking off to LA, she was back, and she wanted her son.

Charlie wasn’t going to just let her take him.

He thinks of you, how you looked that morning, gorgeous, skin warmed with sleep. He wishes he could have married you instead, instead of the cold woman sitting at the other end of the room, standing behind a wooden podium where she’ll try and make every case against him. He wonders what you're doing, it's the middle of the day after all. He imagines you're lounging in the sunlight of your living room, imagines you reading or writing or watching something. He'll call you, he decides, once the statements are done with, once they have a break to prepare their cases. 

The judge comes into the room, and everyone stands up. It’s a race to see which of the two is more polite, and Charlie finds himself with his shoulders straight and square before Nicole can even steady herself in her brand new heels, not yet broken in.

She must have bought them special for the trial, and Charlie does his best not to grit his teeth.

The judge has a seat and waves them to sit as well, lawyers shuffling their papers around to try and get organized.

He knows this is only the opening statements, he knows this is only the beginning, but he’s still nervous. So fucking nervous that she’s going to win, going to take everything away from him. He has to take a deep breath, think of you just to calm down.

The judge regards them both, milky blue eyes peering over half moon glasses, and when he speaks it’s with the age and wisdom of someone who has been doing this a long time.

Charlie wonders how many people he helps split up. Wonders how many children he has to decide the fate of. He thinks it can’t be easy.

“You know how I like to start these things?” The judge asks, hands folding into one another as he gives them both a solid look.

“No.” It’s a rhetorical question, but Nicole answers it anyway, something that makes the Judge’s mouth twitch. Charlie can't tell if it was going to be a frown or a smile. 

“I like starting them off,” He disregards her comment, “By having each one of you say something nice about one another.”

Well, that certainly isn’t something that Charlie expected, and for a moment his mind races, tries to come up with something, anything.

“Nice.” He asks, less of a question and more of a confused statement.

“Nice.” The judge nods, and Charlie does his best to swallow any sarcastic remarks.

It’s quiet for a moment, a long moment, neither one of them wanting to volunteer to go first. They hated each other now, after all.

This was divorce, after all.

“Mrs. Barber,” The judge prompts, when the silence has gone on for too long, “What do you love about Charlie?”

Charlie doesn’t look at her, doesn’t dare turn his head towards her, just holds his breath and listens. When was the last time she had said anything good to him, about him? He can’t remember, wonders if she even has anything to say, anything real.

Nicole chews the inside of her cheek, no doubt pissed off that this is how it’s starting, especially after their cold greeting only minutes ago.

“What I love about Charlie…” She says, picks at the skin around her nails, speaks clearly but only because she doesn’t want to have to repeat herself, “He loves being a dad, it’s frankly, almost annoying how much he likes it. He cries easily in movies, he’s very competitive. He’s _very _clear about what he wants. He’s – ”

And her voice breaks there, and Charlie is almost afraid she’ll cry. Such a fucking actor, he thinks, trying to play the sympathy card, everything just some game.

“He’s a great dresser; never looks embarrassing, which is hard for a man.” She offers finally, when she’s collected herself, gotten a grip, when the crocodile tears have absorbed back into her eyes. “He takes all of my moods steadily, and he doesn’t make me feel bad about them. He rarely gets defeated, which, I feel like I always do.”

The judge seems to wait for more, but when none comes, he turns to Charlie.

“Mr. Barber?” He cues, and Charlie has to think, has to really think.

He had loved her once, didn’t he? Had tried to fight for her, a long time ago. He feels foolish for it now, if only he had known, if only he had seen then what he sees now.

“What I love about Nicole.” He starts, sounding too much like he’s reading from a poorly written script, like he’s a kid standing in front of the class about to tell them what he did that summer, “She’s a great dancer, it’s infectious. She is a mother who plays – really plays. She gives great presents, she’s competitive. She knows when to push me and when to leave me alone.”

It’s not nearly as poetic, as well thought out as Nicole’s, but it’s honest.

At least it’s honest.

“That’s it?” The judge asks, and Charlie nods.

“That’s it.” He replies dryly.

He doesn’t care enough to look at Nicole for her reaction.

And with that, it begins, opening statements in full swing. Nicole goes first, because she’s the one who is making the case, she’s the one who is trying to convince them all to take Henry away from him. He still doesn’t quite believe how she has the nerve, but then again, yes he does.

“The only thing that a parent wants is what’s right for their child.” “For a long time, I thought that what was right for Henry, was for me to remain with Mr. Barber, as his wife. About seven months ago, I realized that no, it wasn’t what was right, it was what was easy. So I did the hard thing, and I left, left to try and make something of myself, something that I had been denied for many years, in an attempt to build a better life for me and my son.”

“I believe I’ve finally achieved that. I believe I am finally at a point where I know myself, I know the sort of person I want to be for my son. I am his mother, and I love him very much. I love him _very _much. And I believe Henry is young enough to still need me, need his mother, in a way that all children do. Not to say that he doesn’t need a father, but, how many children grow up without one and turn out perfectly fine?”

“I left Henry. I left him, and I know that that’s an awful, horrible thing to do. For six months all I thought about was how I was leaving him _for _him, for the sake of him and his happiness. But I’m his mother. I’m his…I’m his mother.”

And the fucking waterworks are back, of course they are, of course. Charlie sits at his end of the room and he watches her cry, and he feels not a single ounce of remorse or need to comfort her, because he’s seen those tears, seen them up on stage, seen them on television pilots and acting reels.

That’s all that she has to say, apparently, because she’s stepping down, and something awful in Charlie wishes she would trip.

He feels guilty about the thought, feels guilty about a lot of things, and almost has half a mind to apologize out loud, but he doesn’t. They’d think he’s crazy for it, if he did. He wonders if they think he’s crazy anyway.

But it’s moot point, because the judge wants to hear from Charlie, so up to the stand Charlie goes, hand on a book he doesn’t believe in swearing up and down that he’s telling the truth.

It’s a much different view, from the stand. A view that makes his stomach twist, because he’s directly in front of Nicole now, put right in her line of sight.

“Please state your name for the records.” The judge says, and Charlie sits up straight, tries not to let the panic, the anger, the sadness show.

“Charlie Barber, your honor.” He says easily, because that one is easy, at the very least.

“Why are you here?” The judge asks, and this one is easy too.

“To request full legal custody of my son, Henry Barber.” Charlie responds, says the words he’s been practicing for a month now.

“And what makes you think you’re capable of achieving that?” Nicole’s lawyer asks, and this one.

This one is the hard one, this one is the one he doesn’t know how to say, how to go about it without sounding like an asshole.

But for six months he’s been taking care of his son, for six months he’s been the one who was there, and that…that’s got to count for something.

It has to.

“I know the sort of things you want to hear.” Charlie says, shifts around in his seat just a little to try and get more comfortable in this incredibly uncomfortable fucking situation, “I know you want me to tell you I make a lot of money, because I do. I know you want me to tell you that I have a stable and steady job, own my own home, because I do. You already know those things, you have the proof of it in front of you. That doesn’t make me a good parent. That doesn’t make anyone a good parent. Nicole says she loves Henry. I don’t doubt that, but simply loving your child does not make you a good parent to that child.”

“What then, makes you a good parent?” His lawyer asks, and for a moment he lets himself get lost, in the way the past six months have gone.

He remembers the fight, that dream once more, that memory. He remembers the way he scrambled, desperate.

* * *

_The nights are cold_   
_For love is old_   
_Love was grand when love was new_   
_Birds were singing, skies were blue_   
_Now it don't appeal to you_   
_The thrill is gone_

He’s standing outside, watching the cab drive away, and for a moment he can’t tell if he feels relief or absolute terror.

He wonders in the neighbors know, if they’re awake and heard all the yelling – if the yelling woke them up. He wonders if they see him practically running next door to your house, wonders if they can hear the way he’s pleading for you to answer your door.

He’s fully aware of how ridiculous he looks, standing there in his pajamas, with his robe wrapped tightly around him in the chill of night.

“(Y/N?” He’s freaking out, not because he’s angry she left, not because he’s sad, but because she gave him no fucking warning and he can’t do this by himself. He just can’t. “(Y/N)!”

You’re gorgeous, when you open the door. Completely bundled up in pajamas of your own, your eyes widen at his appearance, blotchy faced and covered in tears and snot and rage. He’s sure he looks wild, looks crazy, especially in comparison to you, an angel under the porch-light.

“Charlie – !” You gasp, immediately bringing him into your arms, because you know, you know everything.

You always have. He can tell you’re not sure whether to be scared or relieved either.

“She fucking – she’s gone.” He says, and he’s saying it like he’s trying to believe it, he’s looking down at you, trying to make sense of it all.

“I know, I heard – what are we going to do?” You whisper, eyes never once leaving his.

(He always liked that, in retrospect. Always liked how you said ‘we.’)

He sighs and scrubs a hand down his face, shifts barefooted on your welcome mat.

“I don’t know what the fuck to tell him, I don’t know – she told me to_ figure it out_.” He spits, words like venom because they came from the mouth of a viper.

“So then we figure it out.” You say, say with such conviction that he believes you, that he knows in that moment you’re the only person he’s ever truly loved, the only person he’s ever truly wanted.

He glances towards the house, and the lights are still off – Henry’s still asleep. He chews his lip and raises a shaking hand to your face, fingertips brushing the corner of your mouth, and you know, you already know.

Thunder claps, and a downpour erupts from the sky in the most dramatic of fashions. Sometimes Charlie thinks his life is one big fucking movie. He hopes it’s a comedy.

He knows it isn’t.

“Can…can I?” He asks, because this is still a secret – even with his wife storming out in the middle of the night, even with declarations of abandonment, this is a secret.

You’re already pulling him into the house, already closing the door behind him, already shedding your robe, letting it fall to the floor.

“Of course, come here, of course.” You encourage, and he pulls you to a bruising kiss right there in the entryway of your home, right where any and everyone could see if it weren’t raining so heavily.

You kiss, and he strips you of all your clothes, he clings to you, to your body, shudders under your touch as you work to get him out of his. He can’t stay long, he can’t, not in case Henry wakes up, but the sight of you is too delicious to pass up, and before long he’s tugging you over to the couch, splaying you out underneath him.

He doesn’t bother with a condom, can’t be bothered right now, he’ll pull out, it’ll be fine – he just needs to be in you right now. Your eyes are closed and your nipples are hard as he rubs the head of his cock through your folds, as he slowly sinks into your pussy. He doesn’t know why this feels so good, why this feels so right, why this feels like home.

But it does, and it does, and it does.

And as you moan and gasp underneath him as the thunderclaps, as he fucks you to let some of this aggression and anger and tension out, you laugh, randomly, you laugh, and he finds he’s laughing too – because what the fuck is even going on anymore?

He doesn’t know, but it’s okay.

You’ll both figure it out.

In the morning, he wakes Henry up with blueberry muffins he heats in the toaster oven, mixes up some eggs. He’s not very good at breakfasts, but he knows how to do eggs, knows how to do them the way Henry likes.

“Where's mom?” He asks, and Charlie nearly drops the pan, because fuck he doesn’t know what to say, what to tell him.

His heart is beating wildly in his throat, and he scrambles, stumbles over his own words to try and say something to his kid who is standing, bleary eyed in his pajamas, waiting for an answer. It’s obvious, so obvious that Nicole is gone, especially after nine years of her being there, every morning at breakfast.

“She had to leave late last night.” He says eventually, settles on the truth, tries to figure out how to tell the truth and keep it all from him at the same time.

Nicole will be back, she has to come back.

“Where did she go?” Henry asks with a frown, not satisfied with the answer.

Charlie’s hand starts to shake as he serves up the eggs, cheesy and fluffy, scoops a big spatula’s worth onto the plate at the spot where Henry always sits at the table.

“California.” He answers, and Henry sits, takes a huge bite into his blueberry muffin.

“How long is she going to be there?” He asks with his mouthful, and Charlie’s parental overdrive kicks in for a minute, drowns out the blind panic panic panic.

“I don’t know – chew and swallow please.” He says, and Henry gives an apologetic glance with a smile. What did they always say, ignorance is bliss? “But while she’s there, we’re going to get to spend a lot of time together, and that’ll be fun, right?”

Charlie asks, and he suddenly realizes how ridiculous he looks, catches his reflection in the small mirror on the wall where Nicole used to check her hair before walking out the door – bedhead sticking all over the place, in his pajamas, holding a pan of eggs in one hand and face an absolute fucking wreck.

It’s a wonder Henry doesn’t point it out, how red his face is, his eyes.

“Sure dad.” The kid rolls his eyes with a silly smile, and Charlie can work with that, he can work with a good mood.

He doesn’t know what he’s going to do when that good mood disappears, when the full weight of the truth hits this kid. He doesn’t want it to ever sink in, doesn’t want Henry to ever know.

But well, she left them. He’s going to know that eventually.

He puts the pan down and sticks his hands on his hips, throws the small dishtowel he’d been holding over his shoulder, making Henry laugh.

“Hey, what’s that supposed to mean? I’m fun.” He swoops in to tickle his son, momentarily forgetting all the bullshit as happy belly laughs ring through the kitchen, all the while Charlie demanding with a big playful pout, “Aren’t I fun?”

“Okay! Okay! Yeah, you are.” Henry relents, giggles making him hiccup, and when he settles back down he shoves another huge mouthful of the muffin into his face, and asks around it, “Can I have some milk please?”

“No you can’t.” Charlie says, teasingly, as he slides him over the carton of milk. Somewhere in the kitchen a timer goes off, the ding to turn off the toaster oven, and he’s out of his seat checking on the bagels he popped in there at the same time as there’s a knock at the door. “Henry bud, would you mind getting the door?”

Henry is out of his chair and running over to the front door, opening it up and letting the sound of the outside world come pouring in.

It’s almost deafening, the sound, the rush of cars and people chatting as they walk to work or the subway station, mail trucks and newspaper boys on bikes all honking their horns and ringing their bells at one another in greeting. Charlie is made aware, in the short moment he has to cry into the sink, the short moment he can release the breath he’s been holding, that the world goes on and on and on around him, outside of him.

He zeroes in on your voice when he realizes it’s you, standing at his front step.

“Hi (Y/N)!” Henry says, ever excited to see you – because why wouldn’t he be? He doesn’t know, doesn’t know that your heart is where Charlie lives, has lived for the better part of a year. Henry doesn’t know that, he can’t know. To him, you’re just the nice babysitter next door, just a friend. He opens the door a little wider and asks, “We’re having breakfast, wanna join?”

Charlie can’t help but turn around and try and get a glimpse of you, to try and remind himself that you’re not a dream. He can tell in your voice that you’re shocked, that you know he doesn’t know.

Charlie wants to yank you inside, wants to pull you into his arms and never let you go.

“Hey Henry, shoot I’m sorry I’m in a rush, I just wanted to give your dad this. It was in my mailbox but I think they put it accidentally.” You give Henry a letter, Charlie can’t really see from there, but you give it to him.

“Aw are you sure?” He complains, and the disappointment in his voice makes Charlie’s heart warm, because same, same.

“Yeah I’m sure, but I’ll see you after school, right?” You ask brightly, ruffle his hair and make him laugh.

“Yes!” He replies, and you laugh, do your very best not to cry, not to cry in front of him, for him – for them both.

“I’m going to pick you up, I’ll be right out front, three-thirty. Make sure your dad gets that.” You say, before giving him a hug, a tight squeeze that makes Henry giggle, only because he doesn’t know, he doesn’t know.

“Bye!” He waves as you walk down the street in the direction of the train station, closes the door and comes back into the living room.

“Who was it?” Charlie asks, even though he knows.

Henry comes bounding back into the room, letter in hand, carefully wrapped in an envelope that hasn’t been opened. He takes one look at it and the familiar handwriting throws him, why would Nicole put a letter in your mailbox?

“(Y/N), she said this is for you.” Henry hands it over, looks up at his dad confused when he asks, “How come mom didn’t say bye?”

“She…” Charlie says, takes the letter and sticks it in his back pocket. He can’t deal with that right now, not right now. He’ll deal with it when he goes to the theater, after he drops Henry off, when he can steal a minute alone. Tears are already stinging his eyes and he’s trying his best to swallow them, because he can’t let Henry know, not right away, not right now, “She didn’t want to wake you up, it was really late.”

It’s not a lie, but it’s not the truth either, not really.

Henry’s face crinkles up, and for a minute Charlie is afraid that he’s figured it out, but he just pinches his nose, grimaces.

“Something smells like it’s burning.” Henry offers, and Charlie whips his head around, sees smoke coming out of the toaster-oven, realizes he’s forgotten to turn off the damn thing, realizes the bagels are blackened to a crisp.

Without thinking he flings the little door open, reaches in and grabs the bagels and immediately drops them, burning his hand. He’s frazzled, he doesn’t know what the fuck to do, just watches the burnt bagels drop on the floor and suddenly he’s shouting, hand throbbing in pain.

“Fuck!” He yells, because he has to, he just has to, “God fucking – fuck!”

He slams the toaster oven door shut, rips the dishcloth from his shoulder and whips it across the room, and he’s sobbing, face in his hands, already blistering, mind running and running and finally crashing, coming to a halt, because how is he supposed to break the news at all? How is he supposed to do this?

Why why why?

“Dad?” Henry asks, voice small, frozen in place from his spot at the kitchen table, stunned by Charlie’s outburst, “Is your hand okay?”

Charlie’s quick to pick himself up, dust the crumbs off his pajama pants. He sticks his hand under cold running water, and sighs.

“I’m okay. I’m sorry – I’m,” He shuts his eyes, lest he sobs again, and tries to steady his breathing. He doesn’t mean to act like this, “I’m sorry. Shit what time is it, c’mon Henry you gotta get ready for school! You’re going to be late.”

Henry doesn’t move for a little while, but Charlie gives him a stern look, and he finishes up breakfast quickly, brings his plate and cup over to the sink where Charlie is still trying to get his hand under control, goes upstairs.

The letter burns in Charlie’s back pocket, but he’s going to be late too, so he abandons it in the drawer of his bedside table when he dresses for the day himself.

* * *

Back in the present, Henry isn’t there, and neither are you. Just him, and lawyers, lawyers he can’t stand.

Lawyers who’ve asked him a question.

“Patience.” He answers, looking down at his hand, where the scar of a burn he earned a long time ago still branded him, “Patience to try and be understanding when your child needs you to be. Patience to be firm and consistent, to set ground rules that are designed to protect them even when they hate it because they’re too young to believe they’re necessary. Patience to be kind and to listen to them talk for hours and hours about absolutely nothing – but you _have_ to show them that what they like and what they think about is valid, and is worth thinking about, worth talking about in the first place.”

He sighs, suddenly feeling tired, too tired, wanting to call you.

He has a cell phone tucked away, tucked in the inside pocket of his jacket with only one number in it, only one number and too many photographs he wants to look at, if for no other reason than to give him strength.

He thinks of you as he looks up at her, looks up at Nicole.

“Nicole is right it has to do with love – but what is love? It’s not letting them stay up late to watch a movie they want to watch just because they asked for it. No, it’s telling them to not have too many sweets, to go to bed early so they won’t get sick, so they’ll have energy for school the next day so they can learn and play and run. It’s having the patience to be yelled at and given the cold shoulder for all of twenty minutes before they forget why they were mad and ask for a bedtime story. Patience makes you a good parent, your honor.”

He scratches the side of his nose, chews the inside of his lip. She’s staring at him, and he does his best to avoid her gaze at all costs, lest he break down into angry, hate-filled yelling.

He’d never win Henry with behavior like that.

He sighs and looks up at her lawyer, gives an honest truth. Honesty was the best policy, you always said.

“I’m not perfect. I know I’m not. I failed Nicole, in more ways than one. But I have _never_ once failed Henry. I maybe wasn’t there for Nicole the way she needed, but I’ve always been there for Henry. You know I – I wake up in the mornings and I walk him to school. Every day. I drop him off with the lunch I made him and I pick him up and we get pizza on Thursdays or after he’s passed a test. When he’s sad I let him cry and when he’s happy I laugh with him and when he’s hurt or sick I sit by his bedside all night long and I read to him.”

He grows more and more heated, until he’s white-knuckled in his lap, until his jaw is clenched so tightly that tears are threatening to spill from his stinging eyes.

He wishes you were here, wishes he didn’t have to be.

The lawyer paces for a while, in her sharp pantsuit and polished heels, giving him a placating smile. It irritates him, but he can’t let her know that.

“Mrs. Barber doesn’t do that?” She asks, and Charlie’s gaze flits to his ex-wife for just a moment.

“No. She doesn’t.” He says, making the lawyer quirk a brow.

“How do you know?” She asks, and it’s a perfectly reasonable question.

He wouldn’t know, honestly. He wouldn’t know because,

“She’s not here.” He says simply, and it’s the truth. It’s the truth and it hurts like a bitch because he doesn’t know what the fuck he ever did to deserve it, what Henry ever did to be abandoned by his mom. “Because she left him.”

And when he looks at Nicole, when he looks her straight in the eye, he tries to tell her through willful thought, tries to manifest it into existence, tries to tell her that there’s no way he’s letting her take Henry from him.

No way.

_This is the end_   
_So why pretend_   
_And let it linger on_   
_The thrill is gone_   
_The thrill is gone_


	4. Chapter 4

_One year ago…_

He stands, on the stage.

It’s empty, always empty when he’s there, these days anyway. He comes too early and stays too late. They call him a workaholic, and they’re not wrong.

They’re not wrong.

They don’t know that he’s running though, they don’t know that he’s flying, leaping, begging, desperate to be free, to cut himself free from this tether he’s tied around his own waist, around his own finger. He looks at his finger, sees the ring there, wonders when he’ll get rid of it. He could get rid of it now, if he wants.

He’s already getting rid of so much, gotten rid of so much.

“Fuck!” He shouts, loud loud loud in the empty theater, one o’clock in the morning, no one there but the ghosts in the rafters.

Oh, those ghosts. How they mock him. How they laugh and titter.

How they weep.

Or is it him, who’s weeping?

He paces the stage, restless. He’s so restless.

Nicole’s been distant, lately. Nicole’s been distant and he’s been terrified of why, of what he did wrong to make her hate him like this. She hates him, she said as much on the phone the other day. Maybe in not so many words, but she said it. She’s distant, wants Charlie to sleep out on the couch now. Doesn’t want him in the same bed, won’t let him touch her. He doesn’t want to touch her, not anymore.

He’s been spending so much time with you, lately. You, just next door, in your pretty clothes and with your warm smiles. You babysit Henry when they’re out at parties. They got rid of that other babysitter, Charlie always thought she was kind of strange. And you’re right there anyway, you’re right there.

He’s falling in love with you.

He doesn’t regret it.

He’s terrified.

You spend all your time together, these days. Writing in coffee shops, take-out dinners of Chinese or Thai, from the vendors right on the street. You’ll walk up and down Times Square together, point out different people, make up characters for them and laugh when they’re outrageous, or awful, or too good to forget. You’ll sit together on the subway, and you always tell him that the stop is coming up, because if you don’t, he’s not paying enough attention to know.

He spends a lot of time at your house now. He likes how it feels like a home, like home. He likes the furniture and the art on the walls and the general décor. He likes how it’s neat, but lived in. Not messy, like his house always seems to be. Even when Henry is over and you’re watching him for the evening, and you two paint or build legos, or play with his action figures and cars, and there’s shit all over the place, it never feels messy.

He spends so much time with you, it feels like he’s only ever spent time with you. And that’s dangerous, that’s a dangerous feeling, because you are not his wife. You aren’t his wife, but god. God how he wishes sometimes you were.

Charlie paces the stage, restless.

He knows Nicole is home, knows she’s with Henry. He should be too, he should be. But it’s so fucking tense in the house now, with him sleeping on the couch. Henry looks at him funny now, like he knows what’s going on. Charlie doesn’t even feel like he knows what’s going on.

So he can’t bare to face him, or her, or anyone, and he’s here, at the theater.

One o’clock in the morning, at the theater.

He figures, since he’s here, he might as well fuck around on stage, might as well do some work. He’s been working on and off the past few hours.

It’s a new play, one he was working on with Nicole. But then she stopped caring, stopped wanting to help, stopped wanting to work in theater, and suddenly she wasn’t around anymore, and he had to find someone new. One of his other actors, no one special.

He asked you, but you turned the offer down, too busy with your own work. You’re a writer too, like he is, but for film. And it’s different, but not really, but different enough to keep you busy. You were the first person he asked, when Nicole left.

You’re special.

It’s a story about an affair, ironically enough.

He and Nicole wrote it a long time ago, back when things were still good. Maybe they were never really good, but at the very least, when they were okay. When they were fine. When they had some semblance of happiness, they wrote it. Charlie remembers them laughing about how difficult the characters are being, how if they could just talk to their partners maybe none of this would have happened.

Charlie wonders if that’s why Nicole bailed on the play, because then she’d be confronted with the same thing, confronted with how she and Charlie keep making these same mistakes.

The story of a married man and a married woman, both leaving their spouses behind to be together, and all the painful, grizzly, awful messy details that come with it.

Charlie wonders if he had some sort of sixth sense, because he’s been thinking of having an affair. He’s been thinking of having an affair ever since Nicole slammed the door in front of your pretty face, a year ago when they moved into your neighborhood. He’s been thinking of having an affair with you, if you’d let him, if you’d want him.

That was always the scariest part, always the thing that stopped him, whenever he thought about it.

What if you didn’t want him, and you’d tell Nicole, and then the whole fucking can of worms would be out right there?

He paces the stage, figures, what the hell, might as well get some blocking done.

He has the script in his hands, the pages wrinkled and water-stained and ink smudged and lined crumpled. It’s a scene between the main characters, a fight scene, and he clears his throat, stands where he thinks he should stand, where he directed Frank to stand earlier, before everyone left him.

Before everyone left him.

“I can’t do this anymore.” He says, speaking the words on the page, speaking them and meaning them.

And then it’s time for the other character, the woman, to respond, but he’s alone. He’s alone, so he shifts his body to the empty space next to where he was, steps into her shoes.

“Can’t do what?” He asks himself, asks the audience of ghosts, empty theater chairs, too late at night.

“This, us.” Charlie steps back, feeling stupid, feeling like a moron, getting choked up on the words of his own script, “I can’t do us anymore. I can’t face the day like this, wake up like this, go on like this. I can’t do this. Can’t you know I can’t do this? Don’t you know?”

“Oh fuck, this isn’t fucking working!” And then he’s shouting, throwing the script down hard onto the stage floor, pacing pacing pacing.

He runs his hands through his hair, pulls tight, paces some more.

Paces until he slips on the pages of the script and is flying backwards, landing on his ass, right on the edge of the stage. He swings his legs over it, dangles them off the stage, and shoves his face in his hands and cries. He doesn’t know what to do, he’s so torn.

He loves you so much. He loves you.

He loves you.

He doesn’t know if he can have you, but he’s desperate for you. Just to hold you, to kiss you, touch starved.

And he knows now that he’s losing it, losing his mind, when he feels hands on his shoulder. Soothing, rubbing circles there right on the tense parts of his shoulders. He feels the body that the hands belong to bend down and pick up the script, feels the pages being rifled through next to him.

“Where are you?” You ask, voice soft, and he turns his red-rimmed blurred vision towards you, up to you, because of course it’s you, come to rescue him from himself.

“(Y/N).” Is all he can say, but you’re only frowning through the lines.

“Can’t do what?” You ask, ask both as the character and as yourself, asking if that’s the right spot, and he blinks his tears away, blinks and blinks but you’re still not disappearing. You’re no apparition or ghost or dream, you’re real.

His throat tightens, he needs to tell you, needs to ask you.

He’s terrified to ask you.

Because up to this point, it’s been a year of him developing these feelings for you with no way to know if you feel anything for him at all, feel _anything _at all for him. You know he’s married, Christ of course you know – you babysit his kid. But sometimes, sometimes he feels like it could work, it could be something, you both could be something.

Nicole doesn’t want him anyway, if the way she’s sleeping without him, working without him, living without him is anything to go by.

You’re waiting.

“Yeah, that’s – yes.” He reaches on the side of the stage for another copy of the script, and stands on wobbling knees, weak knees, knees weak for you. “Stand here?”

“Here?” You ask, going right to the mark on the floor, the small _x _made in white tape.

“Yeah, that’s good.” He nods, and he doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know where to look. His hands are sweating, and you’re so beautiful, and you’re waiting. He leaves through the script to get back to where he was, “Okay. ‘I can’t do this.’”

“Can’t do what?” You ask, and even though you swear you’re not an actress, he can feel the emotion in your voice.

“This, us.” He recites, moves around you, the two characters moving, circling around one another. He never wanted the scene to be static, never wanted it to be so still. And with you here, he’s moving, he can move as he reads, “I can’t do us anymore. I can’t face the day like this, wake up like this, go on like this. I can’t do this. Can’t you know I can’t do this? Don’t you know?”

“I don’t, I didn’t. I won’t let you give up on me that easily, surely _you_ know that?” And then you’re chasing him, chasing him around and around, “Can we talk? Can we just talk? There’s too many questions back and forth and no answers. Just talk, talk to me.”

“I don’t know what to say! I don’t know how to say anything around you anymore, all of it gets so jumbled up, all mixed up. You mix me up, and I’m so fucking afraid of what that means.” He throws his hands up, desperate, as the two of you make your way across the stage, behind the antique couch he had just picked up just for this, the one he hides behind when he says, “You talk first.”

You flip the page of the script, bite your lips for a minute.

“I told him, just now, that I’m leaving him.” You say softly, and that’s strange, that’s not at all how he envisioned the lines being read – but he doesn’t stop you, there’s no way in hell he’d stop you now, not when you’re already continuing as you sit on the couch, “He doesn’t know why, I haven’t said that part yet. I figure that’s not fair to him, not yet. But he knows I’m leaving, knows I left. I left and came right to you.”

“You did?” He asks, hands hesitating, reaching out for you. That’s not in the lines, not in the script, and he wonders if you’ll point that out, if you’ll stop him.

You don’t stop him, not when his hand cups your cheek, when he remains standing behind the couch. No, you don’t stop him, instead you tip your head back against his stomach, turn your face into his palm, your lips hot and wet as you mouth at his fingers before looking at him – _really _looking at him.

“I did. And I feel free. And I feel happier than I’ve felt in a long time, and now you’re telling me you can’t do this, but why? You’re scared. I’m scared too! Can you imagine how scared I must be too? At any moment you could throw me away, I know that. At any moment you could walk away from me, from this, and find yourself someone new.” And you’re yelling, crying, you’re up off the couch and delivering this small speech to the empty theater, and he’s stunned, because he didn’t envision it like this, not like this at all.

But he doesn’t interrupt, goes with it, and the thrill of the performance fills him with hope, that maybe it isn’t just a performance.

“I don’t – ” He starts, chasing after you now, crowding behind you at the edge of the stage, arms winding around your middle as you both look out into a spotlight he turned on just for this scene.

“I’m not saying you would, I’m saying you _could. _And I wouldn’t keep you. I wouldn’t force you to stay. That’s the worst part. You could walk away and I’d let you, because otherwise I’d be just like her.” You mourn, mourn the possibility of what could be, what could have been.

And suddenly, he gets it, the character. Gets it more deeply than he ever did when he and Nicole were writing it.

“You’re nothing like her. Nothing.” Charlie insists, but this…he isn’t so sure is acting. This he isn’t so sure is make-believe, is pretend.

“I know, but we’re all the same, in the end. We’re all the same, even if we’re nothing alike.” You say, and this is the part where he can’t help but get choked up.

He gets choked up now, because it’s so real, all of this is so real.

Why did things have to happen this way?

“I love you.” He confesses, “I loved her, once upon a time. I tell myself that, that I loved her. But now it feels like maybe I only loved the idea of her, the idea of someone to be beside me, to support me, to love me back. She didn’t want any of that, and that wasn’t fair of her, but she never said anything, she never told me – how was I supposed to know?”

“And me?” You ask, and there are tears in your eyes, and your chin is wobbling, and he brushes his thumb across your bottom lip to soothe you, the two of you forgetting the stage, forgetting the theater, forgetting everything.

“You?” He asks, and this is going to go off script, it has to, there’s no way you can stay like this, read these lines with the intensity that you are and not mean them for your own self. He doesn’t know what to do, what to say, he’s free falling.

“Do you love the idea of me, or do you love me?” You search his eyes, flip the page, “Do you love what I can do for you, or for who I am? Is it stupid? To think you could ever love me? Am I being stupid?”

“What…?” He shakes his head, because now this is for him, this is all him. No lines, no script, just feeling, just him.

Just you.

“You cheated on her, how do I know you won’t cheat on me too?” You read, but you’re really asking, you’re asking as you, asking him as you.

“It’s not, you’re not, being stupid. You’re not.” And he answers, meaning it both ways, meaning it as him and as the character he’s playing on this empty stage, “I won’t. I don’t know how I can prove that to you, but I won’t. I love you. I love everything about you.”

“What is it about me? That makes you want me more than you want her?” You ask, and the dance is back, the chase, as you walk away, as you walk around and around the stage.

You’re pacing.

“I don’t want her, not anymore.” Charlie says, and the words sting his throat when he says them but they’re true – all of this is true.

“Wanted, then.” You clarify, and he sits on the couch.

“You’re here.” He explains, and you laugh dryly, and you realize now why Nicole had laughed when he had first proposed it.

“Here?” You ask, and he can understand now, can understand how that makes it seem like he only has an interest in you because you’re around, but that’s not what he means, that’s not what any of that means.

“Here.” He takes his turn to clarify by jabbing his chest, beating his hands against his ribcage, and he’s standing again, starting to sweat from all the up and down. Somewhere far away is a world outside, but in the small theater, it’s just the two of you, and he pleads with you, begs you to see, to understand, “In here, you live here. You work here, you breathe here, you laugh and cry and smile and shout here. In me, in my soul. You’re fair and practical and selfish and stubborn just like me. You’re realistic and fantastical and have daydreams and goals and you’re here. You’re here.”

“What happens when I’m not anymore?” You demand, terrified.

“You’ll never not be, don’t you see?” Charlie gets on his knees in front of you, falls down to his knees which have given out in your presence, too overwhelmed with all of this, with having you so near like this, “When the sun rises when it rains when it snows I think of you. Of your laugh and your jokes and your fears, deep and dark and just like mine. You’re just like me. And you drive me crazy in the best ways, in all the ways that matter, and some of the ways that don’t. But you love me, and I love you. And it isn’t stupid.”

“In what ways?” You ask, and now you’re crying.

“The way you take up too much of the bed when you sleep in late, the blankets. I always wake up cold but I’m not really cold, not really. Not when I have you, when you’re there next to me. You’re warm. The way you tell me when my work is bad, when my choices are bad. You always tell me, but you don’t try and change me, don’t try and fix me. You don’t try and force me, but you tell me when I should try – does this make sense?” He asks, breaks character at the end – or was the character broken a long time ago?

“Keep going.” Is all you answer, and he nods.

He goes off script.

“I hate when you chew gum but I love how you always offer me a piece. You make sure everyone is taken care of, all the time, everyone including yourself. You’re not a doormat, you don’t let people walk all over you. You don’t let me walk all over you, when I don’t realize that I am. You call me out on my bullshit, and it’s shit to hear it, but I need to hear it. I need it. I need you.” He looks up at you, and you realize that he’s gone off page, you realize that the script is fluttering softly against the floor somewhere off stage where he’s tossed it.

Because this is him, laying himself bare to you, opening himself up to you, terrified that you’ll reject him, and you realize that.

“Do you need me, or do you want me?” You ask, reaching a hand out for him.

You help him stand, and now it’s just you, you and Charlie, because you’ve tossed your script down too.

“Why can’t it be both? Who says it can’t be both? It’s both.” Charlie says, so quietly, “It’s both.”

“What happens now?” You ask, licking your lips, unsure of where to go. “In the script?”

You’re both so unsure.

“They kiss.” Charlie replies, and you nod.

You swallow hard, and take a step towards him, towards Charlie.

Your faces are so close, as you slowly, slowly crane your neck up towards him. Your eyes slip closed, and he can feel his heart hammering in his chest, because there is a year’s worth of buildup leading up to this moment.

He wonders if he’s dreaming, if he’s actually passed out in the theater seats somewhere, and this is some sick and twisted figment of his imagination. But you’re so warm in his arms – when did he wind his arms around you? – so comforting and safe, and you’re licking your lips again, but this time it’s to wet them for Charlie, just for Charlie.

“We can stop.” Charlie says, even though it would kill him, it would probably kill him, if you stopped right now.

“I don’t want to.” You shake your head and that act saves him.

He doesn’t wait a moment longer, before leaning down the last remaining inch and meeting your lips in a searing, bruising, longing kiss. And when your lips part for his tongue, when the chorus breaks through his veins and his blood is singing and he’s electric, he’s on fire, he can’t help but let out a big laugh against your lips. He’s relieved, so relieved, elated, soaring, higher and higher as he cups your face, slides his arm around your waist.

“I love you.” You confess when you pull away, needing to breathe. You’re laughing, putting your hands on the side of your head, on your temples, like you’re fighting a headache or a dizzy spell, “I feel sick about it sometimes, how much I love you.”

“How long?” Charlie asks, because he needs to know.

“I…” You’re embarrassed, ashamed.

“How long, (Y/N)?” He asks again, soft, gentle. He’s fucked up so much in his life, he wants to do right by you, wants to be gentle with you. 

“Since the very first day. It’s awful, I know. I _know _it is. I can’t stop thinking about how awful it is, wanting you, a married man. But…but then you kept being so wonderful, you know? And you kept caring, and being kind and funny and a genius and handsome. And you kept talking to me, and we became friends, and I couldn’t snuff out the part of me that wanted you so badly, so it festered and grew and broke my heart. You broke my heart before you could even hold it in your hands, isn’t that pathetic?” You’re crying again, looking up at him with wet eyes.

Charlie feels like he’s high, feels like he’s drunk, like he’s crazy, all at once. He’s never been more thrilled, never been more excited –

“You make me feel alive.” He realizes, and then he’s crying too, because “Fuck, you make me feel like I’ve never felt before, and I know it’s a cliché, but I feel like I’ve never been in love before, not the way I am with you. All of that, all of it was true, even if it wasn’t meant to be, even if they were just lines – things have changed for me, and all of it was true. All of it was for you.”

“What are we going to do?” You ask, and he likes that, likes the way you talk about ‘we,’ (in the present, he still think about it, about how even from this very first night, you’ve always talked about ‘we’), “I don’t know…I don’t know if I can be apart from you, not now. Not after this.”

“I don’t want to, I don’t ever want you far away from me, even now, even this is too far.” Charlie says, and you laugh when he brings you closer and closer, until you’re stepping on his shoes, standing on his feet, chests glued together through your thick woolen sweaters, “Why shouldn’t we both be happy? Why shouldn’t we do something for ourselves, just once, just this one thing?”

“Charlie, I need to know what you mean, exactly what you mean.” You say, with too much hope in your voice.

“I love you. I want you. I need you. I never want to be apart from you, and you feel the same. So why deny ourselves each other, why suffocate this one chance of happiness we might have? I know the play, I know how it ends, what they go through to get there. And it’s worth it, all the bullshit is worth it, (Y/N), if it means we can have one another.” He promises. He hasn’t made a promise like that in years, one he’s hell-bent on keeping.

“We’ll have to be quiet about it, no one can know.” You say, and he just might black out, “We have to do this the least painful way, the way that hurts everyone the least.”

“Nothing really has to change, if we don’t want it to. We can still spend time together, no one has a problem with that. No one suspects anything’s wrong with that. We can spend time together and then some more, and maybe some more, and some more after that too.” He says, rushes to say, lists off the things that he wants, presses his forehead against yours.

“You want me? You really want me?” You ask, going cross-eyed to look at him.

He feels like he’s never been looked at so much in his life.

“I feel like the stupid one, I’ve been so afraid, so scared, for a whole year, that you wouldn’t want me.” He whispers, takes your hand in his and runs his thumb over your knuckles, cups your cheek with his other one, “We could have had this for so long.”

“What happens now?” You ask, but this time, you’re asking for real, asking life, asking him.

And he takes a step back and stares at the ghosts who are silently watching, judging, betting on what he’ll do. And he looks back down at you, and he finds you’ve moved your gaze skyward yourself, searching for something that he doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know anything, not really. But he can try, try to find out. The both of you can, together.

So he looks at you, and tilts your chin to meet his once again, and you smile so wide when he licks his lips and says,

“Now we kiss.”


	5. Chapter 5

_Lately, I find myself out gazing at stars_

_Hearing guitars like someone in love_

_Sometimes the things I do astound me_

_Mostly whenever you're around me_

Charlie used to love flying, before all this. He used to get such a thrill from the way his stomach would swoop as the plane would take off, would look out the window and marvel at how the Earth seemed so far away, so small. Buildings and cars and people no bigger than ants, while he sat in a great metal bird in the sky.

He doesn’t bother to open the shade now, exhausted of flying, exhausted from all the travel.

But Henry pushes the shade up, because Henry has the window seat, and now it’s his turn to stare with wide-eyed amazement at the way the world comes back into view from behind a thick blanket of clouds. Henry presses his face to the window, and when he looks up at Charlie with a big smile around a mouthful of chewing gum so his ears don’t hurt from the descent, despite the aches in his bones, Charlie smiles back.

“Are we almost there?” He asks, recognizing the monuments, finger pointing at the window.

“Should be, look, see they’re coming to collect our trash.” Charlie pulls off his headphones, stuffs them in his pocket. The flight attendants are making their rounds with a bleached smile and gentle wake-ups of passengers who had fallen asleep on the journey. They’re coming his way, so Charlie turns to Henry and picks up the little bag of goldfish from the airport and asks, “Are you finished with these?”

“Yeah I accidentally dropped one on the floor.” Henry makes that half-frown that kids make sometimes when they’re worried they’re going to get in trouble.

“That’s okay, just be careful not to step on it, it makes more of a mess that way.” Charlie smiles at him even though he’s too tired to really manage the muscles, shows him that it’s okay.

“I’ll be careful I promise, I accidentally stepped on a snail at mom’s apartment and I cried.” Henry whispers in Charlie’s ear, again worried that he’d be yelled at. Charlie wonders who was snapping at his son to make him fear every little admission. But Henry doesn’t seem upset, he shrugs and sits back in his seat with a, “So now I watch where I’m going better.”

“I’m sure the snail knew you didn’t mean it.” Charlie replies, although his brain is caught up more on the mention of Nicole than anything. He swallows hard, gives the stewardess the small empty bag of snacks and tries as casually as he can to muster up, “Do you like it, mom’s apartment?”

“Yeah there’s lots of kids who are all really nice, and the flowers are pretty. We go to the beach a lot and mom says I’m going to get tan, I’ve got a really good seashell collection so far. But it’s really hot.” Henry looks out at the night sky. “Like sticky all the time. Sometimes I feel like when I go out onto the balcony I can drink the water in the air.”

Charlie frowns, buckles Henry’s seatbelt when the little sign lights up.

“She’s got air conditioning, doesn’t she?” Charlie asks, as he buckles his own. He tries not to sound accusatory.

“Yeah but it’s still hot.” Henry replies, like it’s the easiest thing in the world.

And maybe it is.

Some things are easy, like the weather. That’s why everyone went to it for small talk, nothing easier than commenting about the weather.

It had been hot, when Charlie and Nicole had gotten into the fight.

He doesn’t want to think about it, the things they said. The way they both raged and shouted at one another in white stucco walls, bare walls with next-to-nothing of his own design, his own choice. He had called you, had asked you what to put up on those walls, and then, well. It didn’t matter much, did it? He went and ruined it, punched a hole straight through the whole thing.

He doesn’t want to think about the things _he_ said. The way vitriol spit from his mouth, the way his face contorted and pinched and grew red hot, the way he could feel the blood pounding in his ears. How he had been fuelled by spite and hate and blind panic, panic because this was all going so wrong, so badly. It was going badly. He regrets it, what he says. He regrets a lot of it.

He doesn’t want to think about how true they all were, on both sides, and how painful that truth was. The words screamed screamed screamed at one another with shaking fists of fury. Who was this woman that he had married? And who had he become?

_No, YOU fuck off. If you listened to your son, or anyone, he’d tell you he’d rather live here._

_He tells you because he knows it’s what you want to HEAR!_

Voices of his own hatred and fear and pain echo in his ears, pain and rage that he’s never felt before.

_You’re being so much like your father._

_DO NOT compare me to my father. You’re exactly like your mother! Everything you complain about her, you’re doing. You’re suffocating Henry._

He tries to blink back tears, as the plane soars through the sky. He feels sick, he’s exhausted. He wonders if Henry would forgive him if he went and threw up in the little bathroom that he can’t even fit in.

_I felt repulsed when you touched me. The thought of having sex with you makes me want to peel my skin off._

_You’ll never be happy. In LA or anywhere. You’ll think you found some better, opposite guy than me and in a few years you’ll rebel against him because you need to have your VOICE. But you don’t WANT a voice. You just want to fucking complain about not having a VOICE._

He looks out the window, his hands shake. He says he’ll be right back, as his feet carry him away, down the aisle despite the protesting flight attendants. They take one look at him and let him go, let him wedge himself into the bathroom.

_You gaslighted me. You’re a fucking villain._

_You want to present yourself as a victim because it’s a good legal strategy, FINE. But you and I both know you CHOSE this life. You wanted it until you didn’t._

He braces himself against the little counter, splashes water on his face. He can’t cry now, not yet. Henry needs him, he’ll need to hold Charlie’s hand because the landing part always scares him. He tries sucking tears back into his eyes, tilts his face up so they might just…reabsorb into his eyeballs. He doesn’t know.

_You’re so merged with your own selfishness that you don’t even identify it as selfishness anymore. YOU’RE SUCH A DICK._

_Every day I wake up and hope you’re dead-- Dead like--If I could guarantee Henry would be OK, I’d hope you get an illness and then get hit by a car and DIE._

The words are whiplash, when they come back, and he’s got a white-knuckle grip on the tiny counter, gets jostled around as the plane hits turbulence as it begins to descend. He should go back to his seat, he can hear the seatbelt sign dinging, can hear the pilot over the loudspeaker.

_I know._

_I’m sorry. _

_Me too._

Was he?

He splashes himself with water again, gets a grip. Leaves the bathroom, apologizes to the attendants as he quickly walks to his seat. He’s glad there was no one on the aisle side for his row, glad the plane was relatively empty, calm in the navy night. 

“Are you excited to see the new house?” Charlie says in case Henry can see him in the dark.

“Yes!” Henry’s eyes shine happily and he turns to face his dad, “Mom said it’s got a big backyard, is that true?”

“A really big backyard, bigger than our old one. If you want we can get a pool and go swimming in the summer, you can invite all your friends over for a pool party.” Charlie promises. He’ll promise anything, at this point, anything Henry wants.

“Okay but only if there’s sno-cones, Billy had a birthday party and they had sno-cones and they were so good my mouth was stained for three days.” Henry laughed quietly to himself, and it kills Charlie that he wasn’t there to see it.

“We can have sno-cones. What else did you do with mom?” He wills his voice not to crack.

“Um,” Henry thinks around a yawn, “We went to the parks a lot. I’m learning how to roller skate.”

“Really? You’re brave, I’m too afraid of falling.” Charlie ruffles Henry’s hair.

“It’s not so bad, I’ve got knee-pads and everything.” Henry laughs and ducks out of the motion, playfully avoiding getting his hair messed up. It’s long, he needs a cut, Charlie thinks. “When we get home I’ll show you.”

“I’m going to hold you to that,” Charlie nods, and then he notices that the plane is dipping more dramatically, so he offers a big palm to his son and smiles, “Here hold my hand, we’re landing, chew your gum really fast.”

The landing is easy, only a little bumpy which Charlie’s thankful for. He didn’t know what kind of metaphor that would be, if the whole flight back home was rough. But the plane lands, and they’re on the tarmac, and the passengers all sleepily applaud in that way that they always do, and Henry makes a face.

“How come people are clapping?” Henry asks kind of loudly, innocently judgmental in that way kids can be.

“They’re thanking the pilot for doing a good job.” Charlie explains.

“Why don’t they just thank him then?” Henry doesn’t buy it, and Charlie chuckles to himself.

This really is his kid, he thinks. He tries not to cry.

“We can thank him when we leave.” Charlie unbuckles their seatbelts, and he can tell Henry is antsy to stretch his legs.

“Should we stand up now?” Henry asks, always filled with questions this one.

“No.” Charlie shakes his head on response, only to have his son look around him with a raised eyebrow.

“But they’re all standing.” He gestures to people crowding the aisle.

“That’s because they’re impatient.” Charlie mutters, not wanting to piss anyone off. He feels like he’d snap if someone challenged him on something, even something small. “They can’t go anywhere, it takes the pilot a long time to make sure everything’s okay with the plane before they open the doors.”

“You’re really smart dad.” Henry sighs and rests his head against Charlie’s bicep and says so soft that Charlie almost misses it, “I missed you.”

“I missed you too honey.” Charlie blinks, the ache in his heart slowly healing, trying its best to hold itself together until he can sob into his pillow.

Now that they’re landed, Charlie can pull his cell-phone out – his regular one, not the burner phone – and thumbs through his contacts. His heart leaps in his throat when he opens up your messages, half-expecting to find a picture of your tits right there in his face. But no, he only finds the innocent messages of friends.

**We landed, should be off the plane in 20. **He types up, hits send and anxiously awaits your reply.

“Who are you texting?” Henry peers over his arm, nosy.

“(Y/N), she’s going to pick us up from the airport and drop us at home.” Charlie shows him, because there’s nothing to see except plans and flight numbers that he sent you so you could figure out the best time to leave the house.

“(Y/N)! I have something for her.” Henry brightens up immensely, and he doesn’t know why, but Charlie’s relieved by that.

His phone buzzes before the screen even has a chance to go dark, and he smiles at the response:

**Okay! I’m circling, JFK’s a nightmare right now. Let me know when you’re close. Can’t wait to see you!**

“Oh yeah, what?” Charlie asks as he puts the phone away back in his pocket.

“No I can’t tell you, it’s a surprise and you’re awful about keeping surprises.” Henry rolls his eyes and laughs as Charlie ruffles his hair again.

“Okay okay, fair enough.” He replies.

* * *

Once they’re off the plane and away from the luggage carousel, once they’re down by the pick-up and drop off area, does Charlie feel warm. It’s a crisp forty-five degrees, and he’s in a sweater, but he knows it’s really because of you, because he knows soon he’ll see you.

You spot them before they can spot you, and he swears he’s dreaming when he sees your car pull up, when he sees you jump out of the driver’s side and open the trunk. He’s hot all over, itchy, he wants to hold you, wants to hug you.

It’s been two weeks since he’s seen you, and fuck, oh fuck does he just want to hold you.

“Hi guys!” You laugh in excitement as the wind from the terminal tunnel fluffs up your hair. “Here, let me help, you must be tired.”

You come around and grab their suitcases, and part of him knows he should do it, but with his arm fucked up the way it is, he isn’t so sure he can. But the second you’re finished, he pulls you into a tight hug.

“You bet, thank you so much for getting us.” Charlie whispers, and he can feel you shudder out a sigh of relief into the embrace.

“Of course, how’s my favorite Henry?” You say when you pull away and crouch to his level so he can run into your arms.

“I’m your _only _Henry!” He points out, laughing as you pick him up and swing him around playfully before setting him down.

“Shh, don’t tell the others.” You wink, opening the back door for him and ushering him inside, “Come on, buckle in, safety first.”

You all climb into the car, and Charlie can’t stop looking at you. After two weeks of not having you, you’re finally here. He’s jumpy, he wants to tackle you. But you’re driving, and he’s exhausted, and his arm hurts.

He’s so tired, but it’s a good kind of tired, now that he’s with you.

“How was the flight?” You ask the car, look at Henry through the rearview mirror for a second before turning your eyes back to the road.

“Good, not too bumpy.” Henry says happily, watching the city lights zip past the window as you keep up with the speeding traffic. “I had goldfish.”

“I hope they didn’t spoil your appetite, I was thinking we could go out for some pizza. What do you think?” You smile, just happy for them to be back, happy for them to be home.

“I think I’d kill for a slice.” Charlie says, and fuck he’s struck by how badly he wants to hold your hand. “How about you, Henry?”

“Yes!” His son cheers at the idea of proper pizza, and Charlie smiles sadly.

LA had a lot of things, but New York did too.

He nudges his hand against yours gently, carefully, only for the briefest of seconds before he’s pulling back.

New York had you.

* * *

_Lately I seem to walk as though I had wings_

_Bump into things like someone in love_

_Each time I look at you_

_I'm limp as a glove_

_And feeling like someone in love_

It’s late, but that doesn’t matter for the city that never sleeps. You make a pitstop at a favorite place, a little corner shop that only sells slices. The pizza is thin and folds in half like a dream, and Charlie can’t stop wolfing it down, can’t stop shoving it into his mouth. Nothing feels more like home than New York pizza, he thinks.

Especially when you and Henry are laughing about him behind your own slices.

It feels all too familiar, feels like it did when Nicole had fucked off for what Charlie thought was forever, when for six months Charlie cared for his son all on his own. Well, that’s a lie, remembering how so many nights were spent at this pizza joint, you and Henry laughing at him.

He hadn’t cared for his son _all _on his own.

“Hey Henry, what do you think about (Y/N) joining us for dinner tomorrow after you get back from school?” Charlie asks somewhat seriously, knowing that he’s killing the mood. But it’s an important question, and Henry can tell, even as he frowns.

“Why’d’ya ask it like that?” Henry asks before taking a big bite of crust.

“Well just because we’re going to have someone from the state come in and watch us, and I want to know if you’d rather have (Y/N) there for that or not.” He explains, looking at you before looking at his son. And as much as it hurts him to think of excluding you, he knows that whatever Henry is more comfortable with, he’d do. “It can be just the two of us, if you’d like.”

“Why’s someone watching us?” Henry asks, not angry or anything, just curious.

“Just to see how we are as a family, that’s all.” Charlie says.

He doesn’t say that it’s to see how fit he is as a parent, doesn’t say that it’s to make sure the house is livable, suitable, the best place for him. He doesn’t say there’s so much fucking pressure on this dinner to go well, doesn’t say that if anything bad happens they’ll side with Nicole and Nicole will win and he can’t have her win he just can’t –

“Well if they want to see the family, (Y/N)’s gotta be there too.” Henry says softly, like he’s nervous about it, and it shocks Charlie out of his own inner monologue. Henry looks at you, and almost like he’s worried you’re going to reject his broken family, he asks, “Don’t you?”

“If you want me, Henry.” You reply with a nod, because really, really this is about him.

About what’s best for him and his wants. He’s just a child, he shouldn’t have to know everything that he wants, shouldn’t have to have his whole upbringing uprooted because of it. But that’s what Nicole did to them, and that’s the way it is.

He’s old enough to know that, and it breaks Charlie’s heart.

“Yeah, you should be there.” Henry says, picking at some of the melted cheese that fell onto his piece of parchment paper.

You look at one another, and then you look at Charlie, and he doesn’t know how he isn’t supposed to cry. You can tell and so you stand up quickly, check your phone for the time.

“It’s getting late, I gotta drop you guys off at home! Want another slice to go? There’s nothing in your fridge, didn’t want it to spoil while your dad was away.” You say warmly, in that way that you always do, always there to diffuse a situation before it can even begin.

Charlie shakes himself, tries to get a grip. He doesn’t ever want to be a situation for you.

Henry is practically falling asleep on the drive into the suburb where Charlie lives, where the new house is. You’d done a real good fucking number on it, turning it into a home while he was gone. It wasn’t something Charlie had any energy for, and so you took the two weeks to furnish it with things you thought they’d like. Henry is seeing it for the first time, but in a way, so is Charlie.

“Why don’t you go ahead honey?” Charlie says giving him the keys to go unlock the front door. “I’ll explore the house with you tomorrow, I’m beat.”

“Me too, time’s different here.” Henry says, and you chuckle a little at the way he’s jet-lagged like some old weary traveler. Henry grabs his backpack and runs into the house calling, “’Night dad, ‘night (Y/N)!”

“See you tomorrow sweetie.” You call after him, as Charlie comes around to your window and leans his arms against it. You look at him sadly, reach up to cup his cheek. He immediately leans into the touch, starved of you. “You okay?”

“Yeah, just wanted to look at you a little more.” He says, kisses your palm. It’s dark in the suburb, only a couple streetlights lit. “Do you really have to go?”

“Now that Henry’s back we have to be more careful, you know that.” You sigh, and you’re right, he knows you’re right. “Call me if you need me, okay?”

“What if I need you now?” He tries, but you only pinch his cheek and give it a little pat.

“Bye Charlie.” You say, and he steps away from your car.

He watches you drive down the road, watches as you always remember to use your blinker, before disappearing around the corner.

He feels empty as soon as you’re gone.

* * *

_Lately I seem to walk as though I had wings_

_Bump into things like someone in love_

_Each time I look at you_

_I'm limp as a glove_

_And feeling like someone in love_

_Feeling like someone in love_

_In love_

The house is too quiet, dark.

He closes the front door, drops his luggage. He’s exhausted, fuck he’s so tired. He’s so tired, the kind of tired that’s settled too deep into his bones, that no amount of sleep can fix. He’s tired, and he’s terrified, but he’s too frayed around the edges to really feel it, to really feel anything.

Henry has already run up the stairs, already found his room. Charlie can hear the excited happy noises as Henry’s light-up sneakers illuminate the hallway. He’s found the bluetooth radio Charlie got him on a whim, and is playing some song Charlie doesn’t know.

Charlie makes his way up to the master bedroom, something foreign and new and yet filled with you. Your mark is absolutely everywhere, even in the very floorboards. He drops his luggage and steps out of his shoes, feeling like garbage as he makes his way to the shower. He just wants to scrub the day away, just wants to scrub the feeling of slimy dirty Los Angeles away, wants the New York water to rinse his sins down the drain.

He turns the water hot as it will go, scalding, and when he strips himself down and changes the dressings on the deep gash in his arm, he stares at himself in the mirror. He doesn’t know who he is anymore, what he’s doing anymore. He doesn’t know. The whole thing feels fruitless, feels pointless. He wants to smash the mirror, when he sees the bags under his eyes.

“God, I hate, this!” He says at himself in the mirror no one there to hear him. Henry’s all the way on the other side of the house, has music playing off his phone. The music and the rush of the shower drown out the sound of his shout.

He steps under the spray, leans himself up against the cold tile wall and just watches as water swirls at his feet. He needs to get clean, he knows, he won’t crawl into bed until he is, and fuck, does he desperately want to be in bed.

He wants to feel the cool sheets on his skin, wants to breathe in the scent of his pillow. He wonders if they still smell like you. You’ve been checking on the house while he was away screaming at Nicole, you slept in his bed. He wonders if you touched yourself under his covers.

His hand reaches for his dick before he even really knows it, just at the simple thought of you.

You, you, you.

He misses you.

He’s missed you the entire time he went away to fucking LA.

He thinks about how you would have been with him, how you would have looked. He thinks about how you would have smiled at him in the mornings, how that smile would have cut through the fog. He thinks about you, how you would have warmed the side of the bed next to his, how your breath on his face would have woken him, how your moans would have filled the space of the shitty little apartment he’s punched a hole in.

“(Y/N),” He lets his head tip back against the cold tile as soap and suds run down his body, as they slick up his cock, as he jerks himself off, “Oh, (Y/N).”

He thinks about how you would have fucked him, let him fuck you, after the bullshit. After the fight. He wonders if the fight would have even happened, if you had been there with him. He wonders if anything bad could ever happen if you’re there.

He speeds up his hand, grip on himself tight, trying to emulate your own hand. Your hands are soft, they’re supple, they’re well manicured and they know how to twist and grope and squeeze him just right. He imagines you on your knees in front of him, imagines the way soap would wash down in between your breasts imagines the way you’d guide his cock to your lips –

“Fuck,” He’s groaning, smacking his head against the wall as his hips buck into his hand, as he fucks his hand, wishing he were fucking you.

God, all he wants is you.

He comes all over his chest, nearly loses his footing, because he doesn’t realize it, but he’s used your body soap that you kept in the shower and now he smells like you and that’s so overwhelming that he’s afraid he’ll black out.

His heart hurts, when he comes down from his high, and he watches as the evidence of his arousal winds down and around, going down the drain, like so much in his life.

He throws a hand out and shuts off the water, desperate for you. He knows he can call, he knows, you always pick up. He’s got the little burner phone with just one number programmed in. He can’t save it, he’s too afraid to save it, but if anyone were to look at the call log, it’s all you, just you.

He fumbles out of the shower to get himself dried off, stumbles into bed. The wound on his arm is bleeding, again, and he has a spike of panic that the bandages won’t be enough, again. He’ll deal with it later, in the morning, he doesn’t give a shit.

Right now all he needs is you.

The burner phone is in his pants pocket, right where he abandoned it next to the bed. He squints against the bright light of the screen as his fingers already know where to go, his hand already knows what to do. He can’t bear to bring it up to his face, not right now, not like this, so instead he rests the phone on his chest and turns it on speaker, listening to it as it rings.

“Pick up, pick up, pick up.” He begs the universe, eyes closed, fingers crossed, hoping hoping hoping it’s not too late.

“Charlie?” You ask, and fuck, oh fuck, he could cry, maybe he is crying, because that’s your voice. It’s music to his ears, it’s an original score winning best awards in every show, it’s a symphony at the philharmonic and he wants to give you a standing ovation as you ask, “Is everything okay?”

You’re worried, concerned for him. That brings him down to earth, the worry.

“Yeah, it’s – no it’s not. Fuck, are you, can you – ” He can’t lie to you now, but he doesn’t know what the fuck to even say, he doesn’t know.

You’re so good to him, so kind to him, so patient. He doesn’t know, but you do, you do because he can hear shuffling on the other end of the line, can hear you throwing the sheets off of your body, can hear you rummaging in your dresser for clothes.

“I’m on my way, I’ll be there in ten minutes.” You say, you promise, and it feels like he’s just been granted some illegal wish, some chance he shouldn’t have.

His hands shake as they rake through his wet hair, as he licks his lips, as he tries to tell himself to stay calm for just ten minutes, it’s only ten more minutes without you.

“Door’s unlocked.” He whispers into the phone, and you’re nodding, he can tell you’re nodding, by the way the phone statics up.

“Love you.” You say, and damn, no one’s said that to him in so long.

No one’s said it and meant it, other than you.

* * *

Ten minutes feels like ten years, when he’s in bed without you. He waits, just waits for you, his ears trained on the front door, waiting waiting waiting. He nearly falls off the bed when he hears you, finally, stepping into the house and locking up behind him. You come up the stairs two at a time, push open the bedroom door and take in the sight of him.

He’s managed to pull on sleep-pants, something soft and long to warm him, but he’s bare chested and his arm is still bandaged, and you tend to that first.

“Oh Charlie honey, what the hell happened, to you?” You ask, collecting him in your arms.

Something about that, about that simple embrace, has him sobbing in your hands. He’s been so emotional, this whole fucking week, so emotional. He doesn’t know how to handle any of it, it’s all so new, all so stressful. He’s so fucking stressed out, so he cries and cries and you just hold him tight as he clings to you.

You’re talking about the cut on his arm, the one that you now see because he’s shirtless. He’d been wearing a sweater since the airport was always fucking freezing, and you hadn’t seen it. But now you do, and that’s what you’re talking about, even though really you could have been talking about his whole life.

What the hell happened to him?

“It was stupid – I did that dumb fucking thing with the knife – ” He tries to explain, and you’re immediately rummaging through his pants.

“Where is it?” You ask, not unkindly, just insistently.

“What?” He’s confused, he’s so wrapped up in the thought of you, in the thought of you actually being here with him, that he missed the question.

You lean down to kiss him, and Charlie’s whole body tingles, his whole self comes alive. He’s never felt so alive, as to when you kiss him.

“The knife, the keys. Where is it?” You ask gently, rubbing a soothing little circle on his cheek.

“It’s on the night-stand.” He answers, leaning over and grabbing them, handing them to you, offering them to you.

He’d offer anything to you.

He’s offering you everything he has.

You take them and unclip the knife off the keychain, throw it into the waste basket, collect his face up in your hands again, kiss him again. You kiss him over and over and his sobs subside into hiccupping little gasps, little pants against your mouth.

He feels like a drowning man and you’re the only clean lungful of air he’s had in years.

“You’re never doing that trick again, do you hear me? It’s not funny, I don’t want Henry thinking it’s funny. You need stitches, we need to get you stitches.” You’re not angry, which he’s grateful for.

You’re worried, which kills him. He almost wishes you were angry instead of worried.

“We’ll go in the morning, after he goes to school, for now I just,” He trembles, shakes shakes shakes, “I want to be close to you, I need that (Y/N), I need to be close to you.”

He’s begging, he knows he is. Hands clasped before you he pleads for comfort, comfort he aches for.

The cooling balm of your love is his savior, and when you lean back only far enough to strip yourself out of your own clothes, when you come back towards him with open arms that you encourage him to throw himself into, he could scream shout sob with relief.

“You’ve got me, I’m here, I’m all yours.” You whisper, holding him close close close to your chest.

“Are you? Are you mine?” He whispers back, terrified, so terrified that this is all just a dream, that he’s still on the floor of his tiny fucking apartment in Los Angeles, bleeding out on the floor.

“I am, I promise Charlie, I am.” But you’re really real, and you’re really combing your fingers through his hair, and his heart is really racing even as you’re trying to calm him down. “You’re okay honey, it’s okay.”

He wrangles out of your grip, and you frown, brow creasing as he maneuvers the two of you so your positions are reversed, so he can press you into the mattress and prop himself on top of you. You are so beautiful, in the moonlight, the glow of the streetlamps washing over you, some ethereal thing.

He can’t help but litter your body with praise, adoration leaking from his fingertips. He can’t help it, not when you deserve it so, when you are the most deserving of it at all. He is reverent in the way he caresses your body, hands skimming the softness of your flesh, lips trailing after it as he presses kisses into your skin.

“Thank you, for being here, for being with me.” He is so grateful, so completely grateful for you, “Thank you, I don’t – I don’t know how I’d do this without you.”

He rests his head on your stomach and just stays there for a while, just stays there while he kisses your sides, before moving further down your body and opening your hips up, pressing your legs down flat onto the mattress on either side of his head.

“You don’t have to do it without me, I’m right here.” You sigh as he sucks marks onto your hips, fingers bruising the meat of your thighs with ease, not even realizing how tight of a grip he’s got on you.

You are the only good thing he’s had in so long, the only thing in this fucked up divorce that he knows he can count on, the only thing that he knows for sure who wants him.

He’s not even sure if Henry wants him.

“She’s winning.” Charlie says softly, on the verge of screaming. He wants to scream, but instead he focuses that energy into you, into your body, his fingers slipping between your legs and pushing into you, making your toes curl into the sheets. “She’s winning, (Y/N). She’s going to win and fucking take him away. This will be the last time he’s here. His first and last.”

“No she won’t.” You gasp as he shoves his nose into the crease where your thigh meets your pussy, how beautiful it is just for him, how it throbs. He wonders if you’ve been just as sick about it, about the distance, about missing him, as he has missed you.

“How do you know?” He asks, hopes, wants to know, wants some sort of answer that he knows you can’t give, not really. You can’t predict the future, you can’t sway the judge.

“I just do.” You say, and your back arches when he fingers you harder, when he draws out a moan, a real proper moan, from deep inside your cunt. Your hand comes down to tangle in his hair, and the sting of your pull is so good against his scalp, and you ask, “Have I ever been wrong before?”

“No – ” He shakes his head, kisses your body, kisses everywhere he can reach.

“Exactly.” You whisper, as he tries so hard to get as close to you as possible, as he tries to make up for the lost time, all that time of him being away, being across the country with a wife who doesn’t want him. He tries to express how much he adores you through the press of his fingers on your body, tries to express his gratitude as you beckon him up up up, asking, “Give me a kiss? My lips are lonely.”

“They are?” His eyes soften, and he aches for you, as he comes to your call, as he removes his fingers from the wet heat between your legs and smears your own slick across your cheek as he kisses you.

“They are, I get lonely when you’re gone.” You admit, and he’s so relieved in a sick sort of way, so pleased that you missed him too, that you thought about him too, thought about him from three thousand miles away.

“Come with me next time, to Los Angeles.” He says, more of an order than an ask, more of a demand than a plea. He kicks himself mentally for that, for being controlling, Nicole left him because he’s controlling, he can’t make that same mistake with you, so as he cups your cheeks in the moonlight he searches your eyes and adds, “Please?”

But you, you you you.

You just smile and nod and kiss him, when you say, “Yes.”

“Will you stay?” He murmurs against your lips, and you’re putty in his hands, you’re too tired to object, not that you want to.

“Yeah, we can come up with something to tell him.” You whisper, rubbing your nose against his, as your heart beats next to his.

“Once all this is over, I swear to you there’s gonna be no more hiding.” He cards a hand through your hair. “No more sneaking around, not ever again.”

“You’re worth the wait, you know?” You say, and there you go again, shattering his whole world, his whole perception of life, with those words. “You have to know that.”

He doesn’t, not really. Maybe he does. The selfish part of him does.

He doesn’t feel selfish around you.

Maybe that’s the most selfish thing.

“I love you.” He says, because it’s all he knows how to say right now, all he knows that’s true.

“I love you too.” You smile back at him, before having to clear your throat a little. “I’m thirsty, want something to drink from the kitchen? The fridge is the fancy kind, has the filter right in the door.”

“Yeah, better have some.” He nods, not wanting to let you go.

He does anyway, because nothing’s about what he wants anymore.

“I’ll be right back.” You kiss his cheek, and put your clothes back on.

You have a spare change of clothes in the dresser from when you spent the nights there getting the place ready, but there’s no sense in putting on a brand new outfit to go downstairs. Charlie watches you leave the bedroom, and just because he can, just because he’s missed you so much, he pulls on some pajama bottoms and creeps to the edge of the stairs.

“(Y/N)?” He hears Henry’s sleepy voice upon your arrival.

Charlie winces, heart racing.

“Hey Henry, what are you doing awake?” You say softly, keeping your composure, trying to appear as casual as possible.

“I can’t sleep, my body’s still on LA time.” Henry sighs, and Charlie feels awful, maybe he should have read him a bedtime story or something before having a nervous breakdown in the bathroom. But then Henry asks, “How come you’re here?”

And he freezes, ears trained to know what you say so he knows how to verify it in the morning.

“Your dad forgot something in the car so I came back over.” You lie easily. But is it a lie? He forgot his heart, in the passenger seat of your car. You only returned to put it back into his chest. You’re opening up the cabinets, Charlie can hear it when you say, “I know what’ll help, how does a mug of hot tea sound?”

“Will you make it with lemon and honey like you used to?” Henry asks, and there’s that reminder again, of the six months where you and Charlie scrambled, tried your damnedest to preserve what was left of this family.

Henry had used that word, hadn’t he? Family.

“You bet, and two cubes of sugar.” You say, rustling around with something, probably the box of sugar. 

“(Y/N)?” Henry asks again, his voice so small, and Charlie holds his breath. 

“Yeah?” You ask right back, setting the kettle to boil.

“I’m glad you’re here.” Henry says.

“I’m glad I’m here too.” You reply, “I missed you kiddo, both of you.”

He can’t see, but maybe you’re hugging.

He can’t see, but maybe you’re smiling at each other.

He can’t see, but maybe everything will be okay.

Maybe it’ll all be okay.

_Lately I seem to walk as though I had wings_

_Bump into things like someone in love_

_Each time I look at you_

_I'm limp as a glove_

_And feeling like someone in love_

_Feeling like someone in love_

_In love_


	6. Chapter 6

_Time after time I tell myself that I'm_

_So lucky to be loving you_

_So lucky to be_

_The one you run to see_

_In the evening when the day is through_

Charlie thinks that if he never steps inside a courtroom ever again, it’ll be too soon.

He’s sitting on his side, and Nicole is sitting on hers, between them are asshole lawyers that Charlie knows he can’t trust. He can’t, and yet he has to, has to trust that this jerk will say the right things, do the right things, to help him win. He doesn’t think he’s winning, but he just has to trust.

He doesn’t trust anyone but you.

Charlie is sitting on his side, and Nicole is sitting on hers, and you’re up at the witness stand. It’s surreal to have you there, he thinks. Surreal to see you dressed so nicely for court.

If he thinks about it, he knows that you go to really important meetings, he knows you need to dress up for pitch presentations, he knows. But he’s only ever seen you casual, only ever seen you undone. There’s something delicious, about seeing someone so casual, be so dressed up. You’re in a very smart suit, you look more put together than Nicole does. Charlie wonders what that says about her, if it says anything at all.

He doesn’t bother to look at her and gauge her reaction to the way you swear to tell nothing but the truth, although he can imagine the sharp betrayal she must be feeling. Good, he thinks, let her be betrayed, let her have a taste of her own medicine.

He doesn’t bother to look at her, not when his eyes are glued to you.

“Please state your name.” Charlie’s new lawyer, Jay approaches the stand, begins his examination of your testimony.

“(Y/F/N), (Y/L/N).” You say easily, meeting his gaze evenly.

“Ms. (L/N), why are you here?” He asks, formalities, protocol.

“I’m here to act as a character witness, on behalf of Mr. Barber.” You reply, and if Charlie listens he can probably hear Nicole’s jaw clenching.

Once upon a time, you and Nicole had been friends. Not nearly as friendly as you had been with him, but still. Friends. And now here you are, siding with him.

“And why should we take your recommendation of Mr. Barber’s character into consideration at all?” Jay shrugs, crosses his arms as if he’s showing the judge that he won’t go easy on you just because you’re on his side.

“The Barbers moved into the house next door to mine, and over the course of the two years they lived there I acted as a baby-sitter for their son, Henry.” You explain.

Somewhere in the background, the stenographer types away, her nails clicking on a keyboard that doesn’t make any sense to Charlie. He’s laser focused on you, tries not to think about those two years, tries even harder not to think about how he spent half that time fucking you.

He knows the judge can’t read minds, but sometimes the way the judge looks at Charlie says otherwise.

“So it could be said that you were privy to observing the Barber’s family life.” Jay asks, and you have a little knowing smile that quirks up the corners of your mouth.

Charlie sweats, watching you up on the stand, tries not to think about just how privy you were, tries not to sweat.

“I wouldn’t say observing in any conscious sense, but yes. When you live next door to someone you become friendly with them. Certainly when you become their babysitter, you become friendly with the child.” You smile coolly, innocently, genuinely.

And that was the big thing, wasn’t it? That you were genuine, always, in all things. That’s what had drawn him to you initially, that sincerity. As a friend, as a babysitter, and as a lover.

“Who asked you to babysit?” Jay asked, because this was really the most credible part about your testimony, the babysitting.

“Mr. Barber, I only ever really spoke to Mrs. Barber in social settings.” You replied honestly.

“Did Mrs. Barber speak of Henry often, in those social settings?” Jay asks, the leading questions already beginning.

“Objection your honor, leading the witness.” Nora, Nicole’s bitch of a lawyer stands up then.

“Sustained, the witness is to provide testimony on Mr. Barber, not Mrs.” The judge nods, making Nora sit down with a smile.

“Alright, then did _Mr_. Barber speak of Henry, outside of the conversations where he asked you to babysit?” Jay asks, and you nod quickly.

“Yes, very much so. We spoke about a lot of things, you know. But he was always very very proud of Henry. He would pull out his phone and show me pictures, of Henry or drawings that he made, that sort of thing. He was always a very proud father.” You reply.

“How frequently did you babysit for the Barbers?” Jay asks, just trying to form a narrative. Charlie knows this, but if he thinks about it, if he thinks of all the times he’s asked you to watch Henry simply so that he can come over to your house and steal a kiss or two (or twenty) upon picking him up, if he thinks too loudly then the judge will hear.

“About once a week, on nights where rehearsals were running late at the theater company, or they knew they’d be in meetings, that sort of thing. The odd party now and again.” You brush it off as if it were nothing.

But it isn’t nothing, it isn’t.

“Once a week is fairly often, I imagine you grew quite close to Henry.” Jay prompts.

“Oh yes, I like to think he trusts me. He’s so bright, that boy, and he picks up on a lot, you know? Sometimes if Mr. and Mrs. Barber had a fight, he’d find some subtle way to ask why grownups have to be mean to each other. Or when Mr. Barber was told to sleep on the couch a couple months before Nicole left, he would ask why parents don’t always sleep in the same bed.” You say pointedly, trying to make the point that she left. She left.

“Did Mr. and Mrs. Barber have fights often?” Jay asks, as if this is new knowledge to him.

“Through the entire time I knew them, yes. They fought often.” You nod, chewing your lip.

“Did any of these fights turn physical?” Jay asks, but your eyes widen at the thought, at the implication that Charlie would do anything like that.

“No, not to my knowledge. Just, raised voices. I mostly heard Mrs. Barber yelling, when the fights would happen. There was a lot of yelling at Mr. Barber.” You say and you fidget with your hands for a moment, before continuing, “I try not to listen but, the houses are so close and sometimes the fights would be very late, so the sound wasn’t drowned out by the traffic.”

“Ms. (L/N), what can you tell us about Mr. Barber, his character.” Jay says, wanting to get to the point. “It’s clear that you’re someone around him, around his child. It’s clear that you’ve seen the way he interacts with his family. If you were to make a judgement call, how would you describe him?”

“Mr. Barber is a very hardworking man. He’s the type of person who remembers to take care of everyone that depends on him, he remembers things about the people who depend on him, and even about the people who don’t. He is the kind of father you wish every child has – compassionate and playful, but strict in the right ways.” You say, try to keep it as much to the point as possible, “He is well respected in the community, is active in both the theater sphere as well as locally. I’ve never seen him lash out or become violent, in all honesty I don’t think I’ve ever heard him yell in an angry way. His son loves him very much.”

You look right at Charlie when you say that last part, and Charlie has to look away, because he can’t help but feel the tight ache in his chest at the mention of Henry’s love, not now. Not when there’s such a possibility of losing him that he can nearly hear the _goodbyes. _

“No further questions, your honor.” Jay says, before returning to his seat next to Charlie.

Nora stands up then, and Charlie nearly wants to hold his breath, but you don’t. You look at her evenly, and Charlie thinks you’re so brave for that, that’s not something he’s still managed to do.

“Ms. (L/N) this is all well and good, but I’d like to bring up the fact that a primary reason that you are here, is because on the night of a home-visit by the state-sanctioned case worker to observe Mr. Barber and his son, _you_ were present.” She says, as if this is a bad thing, as if you’re breaking some sort of rule.

“Yes, I was.” You reply, your shoulders square and your chin raised.

Because, yes, you were.

* * *

The next day felt like a blur, to Charlie. He woke up with you by his side, kissed you for what felt like an eternity before the alarm even had a chance to ring. He held you in his arms, and for the first time in a long time, woke up with a smile on his face.

He asked you to stay in bed while he went down and made breakfast for Henry, got him dressed and ready for school, and when he came back home from dropping him off, you were still there.

He had hoped that you’d let him crawl back into bed, settle himself against your naked body, let him have a drink of the sweet wine that spilled forth from your lips. But you only eyed his arm, the cut which stung, which needed proper stitches.

So to the hospital you had went, and stitches he had gotten, and after a normal amount of painkillers he had fallen back asleep with his head next to yours on the pillow, dreams a swirling mess of colors and sounds.

He doesn’t remember what they are, when he wakes up. It’s late, in the afternoon, he can tell. Can tell by how rich the sunlight is coming through the window. Maybe it’s three o’clock, he doesn’t know, he can’t see the numbers right now, eyes half-closed still.

You come into the room gently, upon hearing him rustling. You’re so beautiful, he thinks, as he carefully opens his arms for you, groggy and yet still so pleased to see you.

“You’re still here.” He says. He’s not so sure that he hadn’t dreamt your being there, the pain medication addling his system just a little.

“Mhm,” You smile, sitting on the edge of the bed and teasing, “Good morning.”

You reach a hand out and softly brush your knuckles against his cheek. Charlie grasps your hand and gives it a little tug, pulls you down down down until your noses are touching, until he’s nearly smiling against your mouth.

“Can I kiss you a little?” He asks, and your smile lights up his entire world, when you flash your pretty teeth at him.

“Yeah, but then you’ve got to go pick up Henry from school. They’ll freak out if you’re late, it won’t look good for you.” You whisper, rubbing your lips over his, the ghost of a kiss, the ghost of a touch.

“I know, will you come with?” He chases you, careful of the stitches in his arm as he maneuvers you onto your side, on top of the covers.

“Nah, I’m going to stay here, I’ve got to get the most kick-ass dinner made for tonight.” You smile again, and Charlie lets his eyes close in gratitude as your mouth opens for him.

Kissing you is almost as intoxicating, as dangerous as the painkillers. They’re out of his system now, he can feel it from the twinge in his arm, the sting of it. But he doesn’t need them, not when your tongue is so hot against his, not when your hands roam over the width of his body. He wants to have sex with you, but there’s no time today, not right now.

That’s alright, he thinks. Soon this will be over, and you two can have all the sex you’d like. He huffs out a little laugh, post-dream-glow starting to fade only to be replaced with the euphoria of kissing you.

“You’re literally a life-saver, you know that?” He grumbles against your lips as he stretches the sleep from his calves. His nap is over, he knows, he’s got to go get Henry, he knows. But he doesn’t want to leave your side, not right now.

He never knows when the next time he might get you will be.

“I do, but tell me anyway.” You smirk just a little, before sitting up once again, detangling yourself from him. You give his cheek a playful little pat and attempt to lure him out of bed with your body and, “Come on, you’ve had your kisses.”

Charlie sits up too, and for the first time really takes in the sight of the bedroom around him. The last time he was here, it hadn’t even had a bed. Now it was fully furnished to his tastes, and he remembers, he knows you’re the one who did that.

“Do you like it?” Charlie thinks aloud, abruptly.

“What honey?” You ask, rifling through the closet, tossing some clothes onto the end of the bed for him.

“The house.” He says nervously, palms gone clammy for a minute. “You know, do you think it’s nice?”

He hopes you do, hopes Henry does.

Hopes the social workers does.

Hopes the judge does.

But most importantly, he hopes you do.

“It’s a gorgeous home, Charlie. I was impressed even when it was empty, but you know that.” You reply.

And of course he knows that, because you were there with him when he bought it, the house. You were the one who helped him look for a month, when Nicole had made her grand return and served him the papers. They had to sell the house, he needed a new one, and you had helped him find this place.

“I bought it for you, for us.” Charlie says, and he doesn’t know if it’s the way he can just be so himself around you, or maybe it’s the fear of rejection that makes him so overly casual about it, he doesn’t know. But he doesn’t look at you when he buttons on a crisp white shirt, “I was hoping, after all of this, you and me and Henry…we could all live here. If it works out that way.”

“Do you really mean that?” You ask quietly, stunned.

“I really do.” Charlie swallows around his nerves, immediately rushing to say, “But I don’t want you to think I’m pushing you to do it or anything – ”

“You’re not being pushy.” You shake your head, sitting down on the edge of the bed, lightly picking at nothing on the comforter before admitting, “I’d really love that. I’ve sort of, well. I’ve selfishly started thinking of this as my house too.”

“What will you do about your house in the old neighborhood?” Charlie tries tries tries not to jump and scream and shout with joy, tries to keep it cool, tries to keep himself rational. “I don’t want you to uproot yourself.”

“I’ve been thinking about selling it for a long time, to be honest.” You smile sadly.

“Really?” He frowns, the very thought of you being too far away making him nervous, worried.

“Yeah, I’ve sort of outgrown it.” You shrug, blinking away tears of relief at Charlie’s want of you, “I wasn’t thinking of moving far away or anything! But just into a bigger space, a blank canvas. Somewhere with an office. I’m so tired of working at the dining room.”

“There’s space here, you could have an office here.” Charlie says, tucking his shirt into freshly ironed pants.

“I could.” You say with a smile, you ironed those pants.

“I love you.” Charlie says, simply because he has to.

“I love you too.” You reply, because you can. And then, when Charlie’s all dressed, you lean in for one more kiss, one that Charlie lets himself get lost in, before you pull away with a devious smile and a, “Go get Henry.”

* * *

_I only know what I know_

_The passing years will show_

_You've kept my love so young, so new_

_And time after time_

_You'll hear me say that I'm_

_So lucky to be loving you_

You’re in a damn good mood, in the kitchen. There’s music playing off the bluetooth speaker, volume turned up high enough that it fills the whole house as you cook up a storm. While Charlie had napped off the pain from his stitches, you’d browsed the internet for the most impressive recipes you could think of.

Nothing too flashy, nothing that says you were trying too hard, but definitely something nicer than a simple box meal, or something. You wanted this social worker to see how well cared for Henry was, home cooked meals and maybe if he’s good, there’s a chocolate cake you need to frost cooling by the oven.

You whistle along to bright jazz, trumpets and saxophones harmonizing with the sizzle snap crackle pop of spices and vegetables in the skillet, fat rendering away into thick sauces for this grand dinner.

You’re wearing a nice outfit, made sure Charlie had been dressed nice too. You knew how important this was for him, you knew how important it was to come across as put together as possible. Henry had a good thing going here, you needed to prove to her. He had a huge house, all his toys. Friends from school could come over and play in the backyard, you and Charlie would be there to make them all food the way that you did when Nicole was gone and away for those six months. 

This wasn’t about you, you shake the thought from your head. No matter how idyllic of a picture it painted, you knew you were here to help make the case for Charlie, for Henry. You loved them both so deeply, cared about them so much, you had to help. You can think about being a family together again after Charlie wins the case, after Charlie is told he can officially keep his son.

Because isn’t that what you had become, a family?

The kitchen smells incredible, and you’re thanking the insanely long recipe for that, thanking the random food blogger you had stumbled upon.

You add a pinch more salt, before wiping your hands down on the kitchen towel that’s slung over your shoulder the way Charlie tends to do. The music is loud and happy, and you’re in a good mood – until you hear the doorbell ring.

_Shit! _You think to yourself, casting a glance to the clock above the oven. It’s only four o’clock, you hadn’t been expecting anyone until five at the earliest. You scramble to get yourself presentable, calling out, “Just a second!”

You make sure that the stove is set low enough that nothing burns in the few minutes that you need to step away from it, slipping your feet into short heeled house shoes, smoothing down your hair. You make your way through the big gorgeous house and open the door, smiling at a woman in a nice grey pant-suit.

“Hello, my name is Katherine Gonzales, is this the residence of Mr. Charlie Barber?” The social worker checks her clipboard, clearly surprised that you’re there.

“It is! Please forgive me, we weren’t anticipating you until a little later, Charlie’s just picking Henry up from school now.” You offer her a hand to shake and a warm smile, “My name is (Y/F/N) (Y/L/N), please come in, make yourself comfortable.”

You stand to the side and she steps into the house, you close the door behind her. You wince, the music is still so loud, and you quickly pull out your phone to try and lower the volume. You hope you don’t look as frazzled as you feel, as you walk her back to the kitchen.

“Ms. (L/N) – ” Katherine starts, but you laugh good-naturedly.

“Please, call me (Y/N).” You ask, halfway wanting to make that old _Ms. L/N was my mother, _joke, but thinking better of it.

“Of course, (Y/N).” Katherine corrects herself, standing kind of awkwardly in the kitchen. “Pardon my bluntness, but I wasn’t aware you’d be part of the evening.”

“I’m very sorry, it was a last minute decision. Henry asked that I be here, and well.” You assumed your spot by the stove, giving the stir-fry a nice zhuzh so the vegetables don’t get too charred. “I didn’t think it’d be fair to say no to him, during all this.”

“I understand. And are you and Mr. Barber…?” Katherine prompts, making your heart flutter.

“Oh just friends.” You lie easily. It was an easy lie to make of course, you’d made it a thousand times over the course of a year and a half, “I used to live next door before he moved into this house. Ever since the separation, I’ve been helping out. It takes a village, and all that.”

“That it does.” Katherine concedes, looking around the house.

She’s got a great poker face, if she’s impressed you can’t tell. But how could someone not be? With the open floor plan and high vaulted ceilings, the chandeliers, the tall wide windows that let the light spill in beautifully?

“Can I offer you anything to drink? Really I’m so sorry, they should be here any minute.” You say, checking the clock again.

“If you had any bottled water?” Katherine smiles apologetically but you nod happily, go over to the fridge.

“I’m afraid I’ve only got sparkling, is that alright?” You pull out a bottle of Perrier, and thankfully, she’s the kind of person who drinks that sort of thing.

“Yes of course.” She accepts it with a, “Thank you. Do you cook dinner for Charlie and Henry often?”

You smile about the thought, about cooking for them. The truth of the matter was yes, you did. For six months you all cooked together, ate dinners together nearly every day. In many ways, this felt like falling back into the old routine, the comfort of familiarity making you smile some more.

“Sometimes, yeah. I work from home, this house is only ten minutes away from their old house where I live, so it’s easy for me to help out.” You try to appear as only a good friend, nothing more. You wouldn’t do that to Charlie, you think, you wouldn’t compromise this with your own musings. The timer dings then, and you happily pull out an appetizer from the oven, transferring it to a serving platter on the island. “Here, please have whatever you’d like.”

“I already ate, really I’m fine.” Katherine says out of politeness, but you see right through her.

“Oh but I made it special.” You frown, looking at the beautifully crispy bubbly cheesey dip.

“Well if you insist.” Katherine smiles, and you smile, and you think that maybe she’s only so severe because she has to be, maybe you’ll be okay, maybe you’ll get through this and on the other side there’ll be some positive news.

Katherine has had exactly three tortilla chips when the front door opens and the comforting peace of the kitchen is disrupted by the loud sounds of laughter.

“Ha! I win!” Henry is out of breath from it, bright belly laughs that immediately bring a smile to your face.

“Oh no you don’t -- !” You hear Charlie reply, and then some sort of playful scuffle.

“That must be them, they always race to the front door.” You explain to Katherine who is already writing down stuff on her clipboard, already making notes.

“Hey something smells good.” Henry bounds into the kitchen, throws his arms around your middle for a hug and a, “Hi (Y/N)!”

“Heyheyhey, shoes off.” Charlie calls after him by the front door, his voice stern yet kind. You can imagine him running a hand through his hair, toeing out of his own sneakers.

Henry gives you an exaggerated look that’s got you stifling a laugh as he steps out of his shoes and runs them back to the front door in just his socks, before coming back into the kitchen.

“Hi kiddo, how was school today?” You greet him properly as you let him peer into the skillet for what they’re having.

“It was good – hi, I’m Henry.” He takes notice of the social worker finally, offers her a hand to shake in the way that you know he must’ve learned from Charlie.

“Hi Henry nice to meet you, don’t mind me I’ll just be over here.” Katherine takes his hand and gives it a firm shake.

Kids always had a funny way of showing their manners, you think as Henry does just ignore her and turn back to you immediately upon the permission to do so.

“I was asking dad if I could enter the science fair this year, would you help me?” He asks, eyes wide. His hair is getting long, you think, because he keeps blowing it out from his eyes.

“Science fair huh? What sort of experiment are we thinking?” You ask happily, tending to dinner.

“Something with legos, dad says there’s _tons_ of stuff to do with them.” Henry goes to the fridge and gets water from the filter, chugs it down. You smile and shake your head, they really must have _ran _ran to the door this time.

“Why don’t you go set the table and we talk about it while we eat.” Charlie hints as he comes into the kitchen, looking handsome as all hell. He too shakes the social worker’s hand, voice warm when he greets her. “Hello, pleasure to meet you.”

“Katherine Gonzales, you must finally be Mr. Barber.” Katherine smiles, and Charlie winces.

“I’m sorry, if I had known you’d be here earlier I’d’ve – ” He starts, but Katherine only waves it away.

“Not to worry. (Y/N) was keeping me company.” She says kindly, before taking her purse and clipboard. “But really, just go about your business as usual. I’ve got to just do a little walk through of the place before dinner, you won’t know I’m here.”

Charlie nods, and when Katherine is out of sight, he sidles up next to you, wraps his arms around you from behind for a moment. He steals the softest kiss against your cheek before stepping away and asking, “How can I help?”

“Nah there’s nothing to do, why don’t you and Henry go wash up?” You ask after him, “How’s your arm feeling?”

“Stings but I’m okay.” He swoops down for one more secret kiss that has you laughing, has you pushing him off of you playfully in case Katherine comes back and sees. He grins, is in a good mood as he claps his hands together and goes into the dining room, “Henry! Great job honey, come on we need to wash our hands otherwise we’ll get sick, let’s go.”

Later, when everyone is washed up and dinner is served, the three of you sit at the dining table. Charlie, being big man of the house and all, sits at the head, with you and Henry on either side. You don’t know where Katherine has gone, but you know she must be close by watching, listening. You and Charlie had both been worried that maybe Henry would act differently, or strangely with her being there, but it seems as though he’s already forgotten about her.

Or at least, for the moment.

“Alright so tell me about this science fair.” You smile as Henry serves himself a big helping of potatoes.

“Um, I know what I want to do but I’m worried about it and messing it up so I was wondering if you and dad would help me.” He says apprehensively, and you frown.

“Why worried, because of the reading?” You ask softly, not wanting to upset him.

“Yeah.” Henry sighs, pushing a fingerling potato around on his plate.

“Has someone been giving you trouble about it?” Charlie frowns now too, concerned, wondering why Henry didn’t say anything earlier.

“There’s this girl, Jenny Henderson. She was making fun of me in the library today during media.” Henry explained, and you and Charlie immediately look at one another.

“Is Jenny in your class?” Charlie asks, jaw clenching, already wanting to get up and call the teacher, wanting to call someone.

“No, she’s in the gifted class.” Henry shakes his head, takes a big sip of water.

“Was she saying anything to you or just…?” You prompt gently.

“She pointed and laughed to her friends.” Henry looks at you, and then at Charlie, and then back down at his plate, voice very small when he says, “And then her friends laughed. She called me dumb.”

Charlie puts down his silverware with enough seriousness that Henry looks up at him with wet eyes.

“You are not dumb. Everyone learns at their own pace, and everything has their own strengths. So what if Jenny Henderson can read more advanced books? That doesn’t make her better than you. And in fact, because she made you feel bad about it, means that she’s _definitely _not better than you.” Charlie goes to get up, puts his napkin on the table. “I’m going to call up the school and – ”

“No!” Henry says suddenly, “No don’t, that’ll only make things worse.”

You and Charlie look at each other, torn with what to do.

“Honey we aren’t going to sit by and do nothing. She needs to know that there are consequences for her actions. People aren’t allowed to make others feel bad like that.” You say, and remembering how often kids made you feel like garbage at school, knowing Charlie must remember it too. You don’t want that for him, neither of you do.

“But what if she gets mad?” Henry asks sadly.

“Then you tell me, and I’ll handle it, okay?” Charlie says seriously, wanting his son to know that he’ll always be there for him. Charlie sits back down, puts the napkin back on his lap, picks up his silverware again. “How about I wait until Monday, we can call together.”

“Okay.” Henry nods, feeling infinitely better already. You can tell just by the way he’s not hunched in on himself, sitting upright and actually eating happily.

“Since it’s Friday, what do you say we leave homework until tomorrow and do something fun after dinner?” Charlie asks, to get him into a better mood.

“Can we start the project? I can go get my legos!” Henry perks up immediately, looking between the two of you.

“That sounds like a plan to me – but heyheyhey finish your dinner, (Y/N) worked hard on it.” Charlie chuckles as Henry nearly gets up to go bolt.

He sits back down with a sheepish smile, but you only give him a friendly wink to let him know it’s all okay.

No matter what, it’s all okay.

* * *

Charlie steels himself for this, for the grilling.

Nora has approached the stand and is walking back and forth in front of it with her hands steepled together like he’s got something up her sleeve. Charlie doesn’t like it, and neither do you.

But you’re strong, so much stronger than Nora expects.

“What were you doing there that evening to begin with, Ms. (L/N)?” She asks you.

“Henry asked me to be there, so I went.” You reply easily.

“If you’re _just a babysitter_, why did Henry want you there?” She counters.

“If I may speak frankly, I spent a lot of time around Mr. Barber and his son when Mrs. Barber abandoned them.” You try not to feel insulted, Charlie tries not to feel insulted for you, but that barb hits Nora, hits Nicole deep.

“Abandoned is a – ” Nora starts, but you’re not having any of it.

“For six months while she was off gallivanting around Los Angeles with not even so much as a phone call, Mr. Barber needed someone to help him get adjusted. We didn’t know if Nico—if Mrs. Barber, would ever come back, and I wasn’t going to stand by and watch them struggle.” You say coldly.

“Struggle how?” Nora turns it on you, twists your words. “Are you saying Mr. Barber was unequipped to raise his son on his own?”

“I’m saying it’s not easy to adapt when you’re blindsided the way he was, equipped or not. Given no warning, no notice, nothing. I heard the argument when she left, in the middle of the night in the pouring rain. He’s my friend, I wasn’t going to make him go through that alone.” Your gaze is hard, and it’s a shame, Charlie thinks. Maybe in another life, you and this lawyer could have been good friends, you both match each other’s wits.

“Did you or Mr. Barber ever think to reach out to Mrs. Barber?” Nora points out.

“I can’t speak on behalf of Mr. Barber, but why would I want anything to do with someone who abandons their family?” You raise an eyebrow.

Nora’s jaw works, and then she turns to Nicole. Charlie does too, tries to read their mental exchange. Nicole gives the slightest hint of a nod, and he wonders if the judge sees it, if the judge sees anything at all.

“In those six months, did you witness anything happen to Henry while he was under Charlie’s care?” Nora asks, but Jay is standing up before you can answer.

“Objection, leading.” Jay calls.

“Overruled, the answer is important.” The judge dismisses it, and dread slips into Charlie’s stomach.

“Not to my knowledge, no.” You reply, trying to keep your tone light.

“Did Mr. Barber do anything reckless in those six months, that could pose as a danger to Henry?” Nora continues.

“No.” You don’t budge.

“What about in the two months that Mrs. Barber has been in communication with Mr. Barber?” She knows, somehow she knows about his arm.

“I don’t – ” You start, but she gets in your face.

“Did Mr. Barber do anything reckless in the two months that Mrs. Barber has been back in communication? It’s a very simple question.” Nora presses.

You and Charlie look at each other, and even though it’s been weeks, even though he’s fully healed up now, you both know you have to mention it, you’re under oath, you have to.

“There was an accident.” You say softly, very softly.

“What sort of accident?” Nora blinks, as if she doesn’t know exactly what she’s doing.

“He cut himself, but it was nothing serious, he only needed a couple stitches – ” You rush to say, and Nora gasps in mock concern.

“Stitches? My god, what did he do to cut himself deep enough to require stitches?” She asks, pushing pushing pushing you.

“I – well _Mrs_. Barber got him a – ” You start, and even though he’s starting to spiral, he loves you so much, loves you for trying to save him, even now, even here.

He doesn’t know if he deserves to be saved, but here you are, trying trying trying, fighting for him.

“Ms. (L/N). What did Mr. Barber do?” Nora asks, all pretense gone, nothing but a vicious lawyer.

“He used to have a thing, where he’d pretend to cut his arm with a boxcutter, but he’d retract the blade so he wouldn’t be hurt, to make it look like he was invincible.” You say through nearly grit teeth.

“You mean to tell me, Mr. Barber joked about self-harming oneself in front of his young, impressionable son?” Nora scoffs.

Charlie’s blood rushes in his ears, his hands sweat, he’s dizzy. He reaches for a glass of water that’s near the little desk he sits behind, and he’s almost afraid he’s going to drop it, hands too slippery.

“_No!_ it wasn’t – ” You try, only to be interrupted again.

“What if Henry got a box cutter himself and didn’t think to retract the blade, and next time it was _him _who had to get stitches, or worse?” Nora says, and those are perfectly good arguments, which is why he doesn’t do that anymore, why he got rid of the fucking knife, why he --

“Henry’s not allowed to handle sharp objects – ” You speak, trying to backtrack, trying to fix this mess.

“Maybe so, but children emulate their parents, don’t they? And Henry looks up to Mr. Barber, doesn’t he? Is it not outside the realm of possibility, that he might take Mr. Barber’s boxcutter and do the ‘trick’ on himself?” Nora’s voice remains calm and maybe that’s the most infuriating part, Charlie thinks.

He wants to scream.

It’s tense, in the courtroom, so tense.

You and Nora look at one another, a stare-down that’s going to result in an answer one way or another.

Charlie hates her, hates Nicole.

God he hates her.

Especially when she’s the one who thought the trick was so fucking funny in the first place.

“It’s not outside the realm of possibility, no.” You say softly, not able to lie, not here, not now.

“And that would be considered quite reckless behavior, would it not?” Nora asks.

“Mr. Barber is a good person, and a good father, and that was one accident.” You shake your head.

“All it takes is once, Ms. (L/N), and from the way it sounds, this happened more than once. I wonder how many other funny tricks Mr. Barber showed Henry. No further questions, your honor.” Nora pats the wood of the witness stand before returning to her side of the courtroom, and you are asked to leave.

Charlie floats through the rest of the character witnesses. Nicole has brought someone in, some guy. Charlie doesn’t know who he is, he doesn’t care. He’s too wrapped up in his own head, too stunned that Nicole would have told Nora about that.

He’s got one more day, one more chance in this trial to prove his case, one more. And then that’s it. And then the judge decides.

He’s going to have to play dirtier, going to let Jay dig up as much as he can on this serpent of a woman he shared a decade of his life with, her and her crocodile tears.

Tears so unlike yours, when later after they’ve been dismissed, your face is streaked with hot salt as Charlie collects you in his arms there in the lobby. 

“I’m so—I’m sorry.” You whisper out a little sob, tuck yourself against his neck as he moves you both out of sight. The lawyers are talking about going out for drinks later, and Charlie wants to scream.

How can they be so civil, when they’re tearing his life apart?

“Don’t you dare, don’t you apologize.” Charlie says, soothes you, whispers into your hair, “You did nothing wrong.”

Charlie catches Nicole’s eyes from across the lobby, and she sees the two of you embracing in the comfort of one another, your suits creasing from it.

He stares at her hard, hopes she can feel the venom he has for her. She turns away, hurries down the steps and out the front door of the courthouse, off to who the fuck knows where.

Charlie doesn’t care, not when he’s got you right here, in your pretty court clothes and your heart thudding against his. He doesn’t care, only rubs calming circles on your back, tries to get your tears to subside. You both have to go pick up Henry from school after all this, it won’t do to be salt-stained.

It’s the only reason he’s not a mess right now.

Well, that and you.

“I’m sorry.” You say again, but Charlie shakes his head, and when the two of you step apart enough to look into each other’s eyes, he assures you and reassures you,

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

You nod, and you walk out of the courthouse, hands brushing but not quite holding onto one another.

He’ll ask you to stay again, he’ll ask, and you will, and it’ll all be okay.

Won’t it?

He passes justice with her scales and her blindfold, and now…now he’s not so sure.

The way you look up at him with sad eyes, he’s not so sure.

_I only know what I know_

_The passing years will show_

_You've kept my love so young, so new_

_And time after time_

_You'll hear me say that I'm_

_So lucky to be loving you_


	7. Chapter 7 - Part 1

_You don't know what love is  
Until you've learned the meaning of the blues  
Until you've loved a love you had to loose  
You don't know what love is_

**Last April**

It’s been a month, since Nicole left. Charlie tries not to look at the calendar anymore, tries not to think of it in terms of days that she’s been gone. Charlie tries not to think about anything anymore in terms of her absence, he tries. It’s hard, when so much of the house was hers, has her presence.

It’s impossible to deny that things are different. He doesn’t smack his head on cabinet doors anymore, only has to pick up after one person instead of two. He doesn’t trip over her shoes or get frustrated when her laundry is thrown all over the floor. He can keep the windows open now, for however long he wants without her complaining about the air conditioning. He invites you over more and more, your time together less of a sharp secret. You have a key to the house, there’s an excuse now, for you to be around so much – and he takes it and holds it tight against his chest, you being around.

Those are good things, and he holds onto them, the good things.

She has been gone for a month. Thirty-one days, to be exact, but who’s counting?

Charlie’s counting.

Henry’s counting too.

Charlie’s taken it upon himself to pretend like everything is normal, and he forces himself to believe that it’s going well. Every morning he wakes Henry up and tells him to get dressed, gets himself dressed. They brush their teeth together mostly so that Charlie can make sure he’s doing it for long enough, and then Charlie starts making breakfast.

He doesn’t burn the muffins or the bagels in the toaster oven anymore, he learned that lesson the hard way that first time, that first morning. Sometimes he runs late for work and has to rush out the door with Henry, other days they somehow have enough time to talk about each other’s dreams they had the night before over french toast.

This is one of those times where Charlie can’t stop checking his watch, where he’s scrambling to hurry hurry hurry, because he’s got something big, something huge that could potentially walk through the door at work, and he _needs _to be there if it does.

“Henry, come on honey, breakfast time.” Charlie calls out to wherever his son went for a moment.

“What are we having?” Henry asks, bounding into the kitchen in a mis-matched outfit that doesn’t really go together. Charlie doesn’t have the frame of mind to care too much, Henry can wear what he likes, who gives a shit if it goes together? Charlie’s the one who has to keep himself together, not Henry.

“Cereal.” Charlie fishes out the box from the pantry and puts it on the table, and Henry sighs.

“We had cereal for breakfast yesterday.” He complains, going to the fridge anyway.

“There are kids who don’t get to eat breakfast at all, you know.” Charlie’s not looking, he’s doing up his tie in the reflection of the little mirror that hangs on the wall. The fucking knot isn’t coming out right, and he doesn’t have the time for this – he doesn’t --

“Dad?” Henry interrupts his thoughts apprehensively.

“What?” Charlie turns then, gives up and figures he’ll just do it on the fucking subway.

“We’re out of milk.” Henry shakes the carton and they can both hear the sloshing of only an inch of milk left.

Charlie wants to scream, because he hates when people leave only an inch of milk left without saying anything, but he doesn’t even know anymore if he’s the one who did that, and he sure as shit isn’t going to scream at Henry, but he doesn’t have the time to make anything more substantial for breakfast.

“No milk? Okay, um, how about I make us some – ” He tries to think out loud.

“Can I have ice cream?” Henry asks randomly, and Charlie frowns, looks at his watch, tries to figure out if Henry is kidding.

“No, it’s six o’clock in the morning.” Charlie shakes his head eventually, blinks and thinks and is in desperate need of a cigarette. “Here, come on why don’t we get breakfast on the way to school. Go get your backpack, we can go grocery shopping when you’re out of school, okay?”

That appeases Henry enough to stop with the questions for two seconds, and Charlie drags a hand through his hair, runs it down over his face. He looks exhausted, and that’s because he feels exhausted, but he just chugs a mug of black coffee that’s way too hot and tries not to grimace as it hits his empty stomach.

There’s a place around the corner from Henry’s school that has the best breakfast sandwiches Charlie’s ever eaten. He’s gone there a couple of times with you, back in the beginning, way back when you were just friends. Back when he was falling in love with you but too terrified to say anything, too worried you’d reject him, worried you’d tell him to stay away.

You’d sit and order a sandwich and Charlie would order a coffee and the two of you would share the other’s while you smiled behind the screens of your laptops and tried to pretend this was nothing out of the ordinary.

Now he knows, you both know -- it never was, was it?

He almost wants to call you up and ask if you’ll join, but he knows you’re asleep still, it’s early still. He’ll call you soon, when he knows you’ll be awake, flipping through the newspaper out in the backyard like you like to do.

He’ll call you then.

For now, he and Henry are leaving the place around the corner with mouthfuls of egg and cheese.

“Here, hold my hand we’re crossing the street.” Charlie says as they approach the sidewalk and wait for the light to turn red like all the other pedestrians. He offers a couple spare fingers to his son and emphasizes around a croissant, “Hold my hand Henry.”

“You’re carrying too much stuff.” Henry remarks, and Charlie huffs out a laugh that’s also a sigh.

He’s got his messenger bag, and a briefcase, and a couple folders and a brown lunch bag and a cup of coffee from the corner store, and he looks down at this mess in his arms and wonders when the mess started reflecting his life – or if it were vice versa.

“Next time I won’t carry so much okay, but we have to hurry I’ve got a big meeting today, and if it goes well, when we’re at the grocery store how about I get us stuff for ice cream sundaes to celebrate, okay? Does that sound like fun?” Charlie tries to be a fun parent, a good parent, a decent one, anyway.

He also really just wants to get his kid to school so he can run to the subway and fix his tie.

“Yes!” Henry has a skip in his step about that, and Charlie walks faster faster faster, trying to make it on time so that Henry’s there before the bell.

“Is your bagel good?” He asks as they rush, as that skip in Henry’s step turns to a bit of a jog from the effort of trying to keep up.

“Uh huh – dad!” He complains right as he stumbles over a lip in the sidewalk, and Charlie immediately realizes he’s been pulling on Henry’s arm too tight, going too fast, and his stomach drops.

“Sorry! Sorry, shit, we’re okay, you’re okay.” He crouches down to make sure Henry didn’t get hurt at all. He hugs Henry right in front of all the other parents hugging their kids, and he tries to stop his heart from racing. “That was my bad, I’m sorry. You’re okay. Have a good day at school, okay? Remember everything so you can tell me all about it when I pick you up, alright?”

“Bye dad!” Henry nods and then he’s running up the steps to go meet with his friends.

Charlie stays there until he’s sure Henry is inside safely as the bell rings rings rings, an alarm going off inside Charlie’s head as he snaps into action, rearranges all the shit in his arms so he can run to the subway station.

_You don't know how lips hurt  
Until you've kissed and had to pay the cost  
Until you've flipped your heart and you have lost  
You don't know what love is_

“You’re late.” She says, when he finally bursts into the building space above the theater, where everyone’s been waiting around for him to show up.

He’s out of breath, his tie is crooked, he’s jumpy and pissed off because he nearly missed the stop on the subway _again _and he checks his watch, nearly has to steel himself for it.

“No I’m not.” He says, wills it to be true.

“Well you almost are.” His stage manager nags at him and he’s frustrated at himself and at Nicole and at the world.

“Almost isn’t late, Mary Ann, now could you just – ”

“Hey I was wondering – ”

“No, Mary Ann, could you just let them know I’m here?” He interrupts him interrupting her, snaps a little too hard.

He hasn’t thought about her, about Mary Ann. Doesn’t think about the awful sex he had once upon a time when he wished he was having sex with you, back before he had the courage to be with you. He’s a bastard for getting her hopes up, because it’s clear that her hopes are up now, now that Nicole’s gone.

He doesn’t have the time for her, he never really did, and he knows that’s a shitty thing to think, but it doesn’t make it any less true.

“Sure thing Charlie.” She says eventually, no longer coy, no longer twirling a strand of hair around her finger.

He feels bile rise up in the back of his throat as he pushes past her, greets the rest of his troupe on his way to the small room which serves as his office. He gets to sit for exactly thirty seconds, doesn’t even have a chance to fix his fucking tie, before the door opens again and two men in crisp suits are stepping inside.

Charlie stands up behind his desk, squares his shoulders with false confidence and extends a hand.

They’re a pair of brothers, these men, brothers with exorbitant wealth and who pride themselves on being a patron of the arts. Charlie’s only ever heard of them in passing, he’s never been contacted, never even seen them in person.

And yet here they are, in Charlie’s little studio, in their smart suits.

Charlie’s going to scream.

“Hello gentlemen, it’s great to meet you in person.” He smiles with what he hopes is a casual sort of warmth. He wants to make a good impression on these people – he needs to.

“Likewise Mr. Barber! I must admit we were so impressed with your show, I myself came to see it twice.” One of them, Tom – or maybe this one is Jerry? He never can tell – takes a look at some of the awards that Charlie’s hung up on the walls.

Well, actually you’re the one who hung them up, ages ago. You’re the one who had gotten them framed and put up on the wall as a surprise for him one day, the thought of you sneaking in here way too early still makes him smile.

He’s smiling now, despite everything, smiling because he’s thrilled that they like his work, that they like him.

“I’m honored, thank you. Please have a seat – can I offer you anything to drink?” Charlie gestures to the two chairs on the other side of the desk, and tries not to feel a rush of power. Is this how big money CEOs felt?

“No, that’s alright.” The other brother, Jerry-Tom waves his offer away, and Charlie thinks no, _that’s _the power big money CEOs felt, “Listen, Mr. Barber, we’d like to cut right to the chase.”

“We’d like to finance your next project.” Tom-Jerry says with a nod of agreeance, and Charlie wishes that they did take a seat so he could too and not be rude.

“Really?” He asks, braces himself against the desk ever so slightly.

“Yes, really. We feel that you are a well established writer and director, and the MacArthur grant only solidifies this in our mind. Congratulations, by the way.” Jerry-Tom replies with a smug smile behind his circular turtle-shell glasses.

“Thank you very much, I’m – well I’m speechless.” Charlie can’t help but laugh, can’t help but run his hand through his hair because he’s so elated! He can’t believe that they actually meant it, that they actually wanted to work together, he –

The phone in his pocket buzzes buzzes buzzes, and it catches Charlie off-guard; hadn’t he set it to Do Not Disturb?

He remembers that the function doesn’t work for emergency contacts, and when he peeks at the screen on the table where it’s lighting up, the caller ID is of the elementary school, and Charlie’s heart nearly stops.

“Is everything alright?” Jerry-Tom asks, concerned.

“Yes – I’m, I’m so sorry, it’s my son’s school calling.” Charlie picks the phone up, fear cold and blinding as it drips down his into his stomach, “Would you excuse me for a minute?”

He’s out of the office before they even have a chance to respond.

He doesn’t go far, just steps outside the door into the little hallway, big thumb immediately hitting the button to accept the call as he holds it up to his ear, praying nothing happened, he doesn’t know what he’d do if something happened.

“Mr. Barber? This is – ”

“Is Henry alright?” Charlie doesn’t have the patience to be polite, not when his hands sweat and his heart pounds and he’s so tense he feels like he could snap into a thousand tiny pieces.

“Yes he’s fine, he says he forgot to get his workbook from home before arriving at school, is it possible you could bring it in? I hate to bother you but we’re using it extensively today.” The teacher says, and Charlie’s almost stunned by how innocuous the issue is.

He had nearly whipped up a whole scenario where Henry was being whisked away to the hospital right that very second, and the whiplash of it only being forgotten homework or whatever the fuck it was, has him stuttering all over the place.

“Uh, yeah, I can have someone drop it off.” Charlie says, already pulling the phone away from his face.

“Thank you, have a nice day.” The teacher says something along those lines, but he doesn’t really know because he’s hanging up on her, dialing your number as fast as he can.

“Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuck.” He whispers into the phone, willing you to pick up, checking his watch, begging the powers that be that you’ll answer, that you’re awake.

“Hey honey.” Your groggy voice crackles to life, probably the first time you’re using your voice for the day.

If this were any other circumstance, he’d savor that feeling, the way your voice is like velvet being rubbed the wrong way in the mornings, before you’ve had your coffee you’re still like satin like silk like everything he’s not good enough for.

But there are rich men in his office and they’re waiting for him and so is Henry and the teacher and the world and he doesn’t have the time to savor it even though he desperately wants to.

“(Y/N) I’m so fucking sorry to bother you but can you go into the house and find Henry’s workbook? It’s blue and has letters on it and a hippo. He left it I think on the dining room table?” The urgency in his voice bleeds through to you, because he can never really hold himself back around you.

“You got it, I’m going right now.” You say, and he can hear the rustling of your sheets and his heart soars.

“Thank you so fucking much, thank you, I’d do it but I’m literally in the middle of a meeting.” He’d drop down to his knees if you were there, he’s so filled with gratitude.

“Go, don’t worry, I’ve got it.” You’re blowing kisses into the phone quickly, that urgency of his now transferred to you.

“Thank you, I love you.” He says, hanging up the phone on you and feeling awful about it, before trying to get a fucking grip.

He takes a deep breath, sets his phone back in his pocket, and appears cool as a cucumber as he re-enters his office.

“So sorry gentlemen, where were we?” He returns behind his desk, giving them a friendly smile that suggested all was well.

“The new project, we’ve been hearing buzz that you and your wife have been rehearsing a script but have been struggling to find additional funding for the more…avant-garde aspects.” Tom-Jerry says.

Charlie’s entire stomach plummets.

Sometimes, Charlie really isn’t so sure if he can take much more.

“My wife.” He repeats, the words sounding robotic to his ears.

“Yes, Nicole Barber? She was superb in the previous show.” Tom-Jerry confirms, and he realizes that he must have said something wrong, because he can see the color drain from Charlie’s face.

“Thank you. She um.” He tries not to scream the words, tries not to shout them out until he’s hoarse, tries not to go down the rabbit hole of _she left she hates me she doesn’t work with me anymore I don’t want to work with her I don’t like her I don’t love her don’t call her my wife she’s not my fucking wife she hasn’t been for a long time. _Instead he swallows that down, says, “We’re no longer together, she lives in Los Angeles now.”

“Oh I’m so sorry to hear that.” They say almost in unison, and Charlie tries tries tries to get a grip.

He needs more coffee than the shitty cup of corner store brew, maybe he’ll ask Mary Ann to get him some.

That thought makes him feel like shit.

“It’s – the new play is on hold, I’ve been working on something else that’s new with the troupe, if you’d like you’re more than welcome to hear the treatment.” Charlie offers meekly, wondering if they’ll even want him now, wondering if he’s any fucking good on his own.

“If you wrote it, we’re sure it’s worth it.” Jerry-Tom seems to be a mind reader, and Charlie doesn’t know if he wants to laugh or cry, and maybe Jerry-Tom can tell, because he checks his watch politely with a, “Perhaps we can come back at a later date – ”

“No, no it’s fine. I’m sorry, please, you have my undivided attention.” Charlie does sit then, and he doesn’t care if it’s unprofessional or not, he doesn’t care.

He doesn’t think his legs can hold him up anymore, he thinks he might be sick if he keeps standing.

* * *

They talk well into the afternoon, past the lunch hour. It’s so refreshing, Charlie thinks, now that he’s calmed down, now that he’s back in his element. The brothers (he finally learns their names) ask for the treatment, they like it. They ask to watch rehearsals, they love it. The troupe is on cloud nine, Charlie is over the moon. He wants to tell you all about it, wants to – he realizes the time just then, it’s nearly four o’clock.

Henry gets out of school at three-fifteen.

He doesn’t think he’s ever called rehearsals closed and ran out of the office that quickly in his entire fucking life.

He runs from the theater to the subway, from the subway to the station, from the train to the house. His phone buzzes buzzes buzzes in his pocket, and he sees ten missed messages from you, three missed calls.

You’re calling him now.

“(Y/N)?” He shoves the phone against his ear, heart racing, running running running.

“Charlie where are you?” You ask, and you’re worried, and something about that worry pangs his chest too harsh, makes him stop around the corner, has to brace himself on a lamppost.

“Shit I’m so – I’m so fucking sorry I’m literally running to you now, I’m – ”

“Deep breaths, it’s okay. I picked him up, we’re at your house. You have like no food here, you know that? Do you want me to – ”

“I’m coming, I’m right here I’m here.” You and Charlie talk over each other all the way until he reaches the front door, until he wrenches it open and is faced with you and his son in the living room, making drawings with crayons. He puts his hands on his hips and tries very hard not to look like he just ran fifteen blocks, “Hey Henry!”

“You said you’d pick me up.” Henry’s not happy, he doesn’t even bother to look up at Charlie from where he’s drawing a very elaborate looking robot.

“I know, I’m sorry, I’m.” Charlie really has to catch his breath, there’s a pain in his side that he presses a hand to, has to lean on the credenza. “I’m sorry. But you got to spend some time with (Y/N), and that’s fun, isn’t it?”

Charlie looks at you with wide pleading eyes, and he can tell that you’re itching to hold him, itching to get your arms around him.

And that fucking _kills _him, it kills him. Because even now that Nicole is gone, he still can’t have you. Not yet, he can’t yet. It’s all too up in the air, all too uncertain, too soon. He could scream, with how unfair it is – even from a thousand miles away she’s still fucking him over.

He wants to pull you into his arms and hold you tight and kiss you in front of Henry, and he wants it to not be a big deal. But he can’t, because it would be, because he’s still married, technically. He’s still got a wife, technically. One who could show up again any day now and she’d see – she’d know, about the affair. If he lets himself have this now, have you now, the whole world would know about the affair.

And then she would surely take everything away from him, and he doesn’t…he can’t risk that.

You know, he can tell that you know because even though your hands are literally stopping themselves from reaching out to him, you’re not angry about it. You’ve never been angry with Charlie, not in any real way.

You’re probably the only person who isn’t, anymore.

Henry’s angry, coloring away.

“Yeah.” Henry says, and it’s clipped, and Charlie knows he should back off and give his son space, but he sits himself down next to Henry on the couch instead.

You’re over in the armchair, the one that only you ever really seem to sit in. Charlie’s begun to think of it as your chair, your little space in this home. In a sea of reminders of Nicole, that armchair is a safe haven, an island where he can safely come ashore.

“Hey why don’t we all go grocery shopping together, I’ll even let you push the cart.” Charlie offers, knowing that the incentive might earn him some brownie points.

“You will?” Henry takes the bait, and he peeks out at the side of his eye at Charlie, who pretends not to notice.

“Yup, and we’ll get the stuff for sundaes too.” He nods, and this makes him perk up entirely.

“Really?” He asks with a smile now, and Charlie takes in a breath of relief.

“You bet, remember how I said I had a big meeting? It went great, and that’s why I was late, and I’m sorry and it’ll never happen again, okay?” He apologizes, really means it, and Henry can tell.

Henry wraps his arms around Charlie’s middle, presses his face against Charlie’s chest and lets out a sigh himself.

“Okay.” He nods, and Charlie rubs his back for a minute, feeling awful for fucking up so badly like this. Then he asks something that makes Charlie’s heart warm so much that he wonders if Henry can feel it from where his face is still smushed, “(Y/N) will you come too?”

Charlie looks at you, and you smile, and he wishes you could join the hug, wishes you could sit yourself right next to him and he could hold you too. But he can’t, so you only smile from the armchair that he’s decided is yours and you nod.

“I can pick some stuff up for my house, yeah.” You say, and that seals the deal.

_Do you know how a lost heart fears  
The thought of reminiscing  
And how lips have taste of tears  
Lose the taste for kissing_

You drive to the supermarket together. Charlie drives and you sit in the passenger seat, and Henry sits in the back trying his best to read aloud the slogans on the reusable shopping bags. He’s getting better, Charlie has been helping him more and more. He always helped him with his schoolwork, but now…he maybe has been overcompensating Nicole’s absence, she used to help him too.

But he’s trying, and he’s getting better because of the practice, and Charlie can’t stop smiling about it. He can’t stop smiling in general, because for the first time in a month, with you and him all heading to the grocery store, things feel normal, things feel like they could pass for a normal, every day family.

If someone pulled up to them at a red light, they wouldn’t know that he’s a single father cheating on his wife with his best friend, desperately trying to hang on and adjust to this new way of living and working in the wake of Nicole’s selfish absence -- they’d just see the three of you singing along to the radio.

And that’s a really shitty fucking feeling, Charlie thinks. Because he could have that, he could have had that for so long. He could have had the balls to just tell Nicole he didn’t love her anymore, that he didn’t want to be together anymore, and then maybe none of this would have happened. A year of hiding and sneaking around, months of sleeping on the couch or in the theater or in a hotel with you.

But he didn’t do any of that, and now here you all are, getting out of the car at the fucking grocery store of all places – what was more domestic than this? 

“Okay, let’s see what’s on the list…” Charlie says, as he unfolds a little piece of lined paper that you had been working on while Henry colored, “I know, Henry why don’t you go and pick out what kind of ice cream you want for tonight, can you do that for me?”

“Yes!” Henry says, taking his job very seriously and going straight to the dairy section, while you and Charlie grab a cart from the little spot by the front door.

With Henry on his mission, Charlie lets his shoulders sag a little. 

“The meeting went well?” You ask with a small smile, wanting to bring him back to happy, always trying to bring him back to happy.

You walk down one of the aisles, a random one that’s got absolutely nothing on the list, but one that’s blissfully empty, a rarity on an afternoon like this. Charlie follows, because he’ll always follow you, and you both stare at a random assortment of pet food, for pets you don’t own, and it feels all too similar to your secret meetings back in the beginning.

Meetings where you and Charlie would plan to do your groceries at the same time, just so you could have some time together at all. Together but apart, that’s how it had always been, hadn’t it? Even now, though you’re standing so close to one another, your shoulders barely brushing, he’s painfully aware that still you have to wait.

But…but you _are _so close, and your shoulders _are _just barely brushing, and he could…if he wanted to, he could take a half step closer to you and hold your hand.

It’s been a month, since she left. Surely that was long enough to excuse this small action, this gesture of friendship, wasn’t it? He doesn’t have a very strong will when it comes to holding himself back from you, and even though he wants to kiss you in the middle of the fucking pet food aisle, he lets himself have this, a few of your fingers wrapped around a few of his own.

“They want to finance the play.” Charlie says, because he’s told you about it over glasses of warm drinks late at night while Henry sleeps, the rumors about the brothers.

You forget yourself for a minute, and you wrap him up in a big congratulatory hug, and he hugs you back, because for the first time in so long he has someone he can share good news with, someone who is actually happy for him, someone who cares.

“That’s amazing!” You say too loud, and you laugh out in excitement and he laughs too, and you’re holding onto each other as someone bumps their cart into yours and try to reach around for a can of purina.

You detangle yourselves, the reminder that you’re out in the world a little too harsh, but still you both beam at one another, your happiness infectious.

“Thank you.” Charlie laughs, feeling good about something, feeling good about being with you, even in the strained way you have to be together. He sighs then though, scrubs a hand down his face. “Thank you again, for earlier, I’m sorry I didn’t mean to spring that on you.”

You loop your arm around his in the way that you sometimes do when the both of you walk around anonymously in Times Square, the crook of your elbows hooking around each other in the way that Charlie’s heart wants to wrap around yours all the time.

“You can always spring shit on me, okay?” You say softly, sincerely, “I’m here for you, you and Henry. I mean that.”

He looks at you, and he can feel his heart beat in his throat because what if he kissed you, right there? What if he leaned down and put his lips on yours for just a second? He looks around and maybe now he’s being suspicious, maybe now he’s getting himself paranoid, because the more he looks the more it feels like everyone else in the grocery store _knows _that this is an affair.

He has no idea when Henry is going to come back, so he decides not to risk it, the kiss.

His lips burn, but he can’t risk it.

“Would you join us for dinner and ice cream tonight? Sometimes when it’s just the two of us, I think he can feel the weight of her absence.” Charlie asks instead, not letting your arm go.

“How are you holding up?” You ask instead of answering, because the both of you know that his question is really a formality, of course you’ll come over, you’ll always come over. Charlie keeps asking you to come over and you always say yes.

He doesn’t know what he’ll do if you ever say no.

You rest your head on his shoulder for a second, as he thinks and thinks and thinks about his answer, tries not to sound pathetic about it.

“I don’t think I am.” He chews on the inside of his cheek, growing frustrated and angry and he tries to blink away tears of frustration as he spills his thoughts on the grocery store floor. “I mean, am I? I wake up, I get dressed, I take care of him and then I try to work and then I come home and take care of him and try to answer his questions and then I lie awake in bed so fucking angry that I could scream. I’m so angry all the time that she’s the one who did this – not to me, but to him.”

He runs a hand through his hair, and you’re patient and you listen to him and Charlie wants to kiss you.

“I – I feel sick about it but I’m so fucking happy that she’s gone I just wish she hadn’t left like this. I wish it could have been something I had any say in, because god knows I have so much to say. And part of me feels like a shitty dad because there’s stuff about Henry that I don’t know because he never told me, even though I try so hard to be there for him all the time, and I try to learn everything I can. I try. But then I fuck up and I wonder if I even know anything about him at all.”

He's breathing hard and getting himself frustrated but you just rest your head on his shoulder, and you squeeze his arm in yours in a reassuring way, and suddenly, suddenly it seems like all his troubles melt away.

“You’re not a shitty father.” You say, “You’re a good father, in a shitty situation.”

How do you always know what to say?

He doesn’t deserve you, doesn’t deserve anything that you give him.

“I’m sorry.” He replies, but for what he isn’t so sure. There’s too much, that he could apologize for, how is he supposed to choose?

“Don’t.” You say, pulling away from him, taking the list out of his hand, because really he needs to snap back to reality, needs to stop bitching in the middle of this pet food aisle. “Now what kind of laundry detergent do you get?”

“It’s orange!” Henry’s voice pipes up from behind them, and you and Charlie separate further as fast as you can.

“Henry don’t scare people like that.” Charlie startles, tips of his ears going red. How long had he been standing there? How much had he heard? What had he seen?

Charlie almost wants to ask, but Henry is bright-eyed and happy, arms filled with pints of flavors of ice cream that normally Charlie wouldn’t dare entertain. He doesn’t look upset or angry or even curious in that way he always is when he sees something he doesn’t really understand, so Charlie counts his lucky fucking stars that Henry must have just only now walked over from the freezer section.

“The laundry, it’s orange.” Henry repeats himself, dumping all the stuff into the cart and pushing his way in front of Charlie to get his hands around the railing, assuming control of the cart the way Charlie had promised.

You and Charlie look at each other and shared a look that practically screams _holy shit that was close, _and then you’re smiling out your nerves, walking alongside Henry down to the laundry detergent aisle and happily chatting with him, “Thank you, come and help us find the other colors, hm?”

Charlie watches the two of you walk, watches you smile and laugh, and when you throw a look over your shoulder at him and reach out a hand, he’s practically compelled to take it.

_You don't know how hearts burn  
For love that cannot live, yet never dies  
Until you've faced each dawn with sleepless eyes  
How could you know what love is, what love is  
What love is_


	8. Chapter 7 - Part 2

_Each time I look at you is like the first time  
Each time you're near me the thrill is new  
And there is nothing that I wouldn't do for  
The rare delight of the sight of you for_

**June**

Time flies, another month passes, and another one. The heat of summer begins to set in, school is out for the summer. In previous years, Henry had gone away to a really nice summer camp, a place upstate where he stays and lives for eight weeks. Charlie doesn’t feel right doing that now, doesn’t feel right sending his kid away.

Henry hadn’t brought it up, so neither did Charlie, and as school came to an end, he and Henry spent more and more time together.

You had spent more and more time with them too.

The routine has gotten a little easier, now that he can just bring Henry along with him to work. Sometimes you come too, sometimes you don’t. You help revise his scripts, but sometimes you have your own things to work on and he respects that. He respects you, he loves you. You always cook them dinner now though, using that key to his house to let yourself in and surprise them with a hot meal, and fuck he loves you.

It’s strange, how things have shifted. The three of you eat dinners together and play board games and watch movies, you go to the park and Henry gets to pet dogs of nice neighbors walking by. Henry hangs out with the interns when they’re not running coffee at the theater, sometimes you and Charlie bring Henry to Coney Island and play boardwalk games and eat sno-cones and cotton candy.

Henry has friends that he spends time with, sleepovers with his buddies from school that give him a good chance to play with his pals. It gives Charlie a good chance to be intimate with you.

Out of everything else, the ability to have sex with you in his own home, in his own bed, is _intoxicating. _Charlie can’t remember the last time he had sex in his own bed, and isn’t that pathetic? If Henry is out of the house for the weekend, he doesn’t have to worry about anyone barging in, anyone overhearing.

Those weekends are precious, weekends where he can take you apart on his mouth, his fingers, his cock. You blow him in the kitchen and smile up at him with come on your chin and Charlie thinks, just thinks about how if he doesn’t hear from Nicole soon, he’ll go after her himself with divorce papers. He’ll make this thing final once and for all, he won’t be tied to her anymore, he’ll get to have you.

He’ll have you and Henry and maybe he’ll buy a new house to get rid of the memories of her, and you all can start fresh, a clean slate.

He talks about that sometimes, when you’re lying naked on his sweaty chest after he’s given you a mind-blowing orgasm and the heat of the summer begins to set in. He talks about a clean slate, moving forward, moving on.

Because that’s all he can do, isn’t it? Move on.

You spend the night sometimes, if you and Charlie stay up too late helping Henry with his summer reading assignments. He knows your house is right next door, he knows. But the bed upstairs is a shorter walk, and Henry hasn’t questioned it yet when he wakes up to you cooking blueberry pancakes. He looks forward to it, inf act.

There’s laughter in the house again, laughter which had been absent for so long.

Charlie is happy, and you are happy.

Henry is happy, it seems.

Things are good, it seems.

Until, of course, it isn’t.

_The more I see you, the more I want you  
Somehow this feeling just grows and grows  
With every sigh I become more mad about you  
More lost without you and so it goes_

It’s a rare evening, one where you have work meetings of your own and you can’t be there to have dinner with Henry and Charlie. The weather earlier in the day was kind of shitty, a random summer rain that darkened the skies, and Charlie had gotten soaked leaving the theater with Henry because hadn’t brought an umbrella. His messenger bag got soaked too, wetting through important papers that he’s begging praying pleading will dry and not be too fucked up, too smudged.

They had arrived home wet and cold, in pretty poor spirits, and it seemed like it was just going to be one of _those days_. Everyone had those days every once in a while, didn’t they? Where you wanted to curl up in bed and just wake up to a fresh morning, fresh mood? Where too many little things just keep going wrong, and you don’t have enough energy to really confront any of it?

But he’s got Henry, and he can’t just ignore his responsibilities as a parent because he’s soaked to the bone, so after they each took a quick shower to warm up and changed into comfortable clothes, Charlie asked Henry to help him make a simple dinner before doing some reading.

On rare occasions where you didn’t join them for dinner, Charlie and Henry would cook together in the kitchen, Henry would help chop the vegetables and Charlie would sear some meat and it wouldn’t be fancy, but it would be okay because they made it together, and they’d talk talk talk about everything and nothing, and Henry would ask question after question that Charlie would try to answer.

This time though, Henry’s quiet as he chops the vegetables.

He’s quiet as he eats too.

In fact, he doesn’t even really eat his food that they made together. Not in the way where he doesn’t like it, but in that way where he doesn’t even want to bother, simply pushing broccoli around his plate lamely. Maybe Charlie’s too paranoid, maybe he’s pent up, maybe he’s frustrated and stressed out and angry and sad all at the same time, he doesn’t know.

But the sight of Henry pushing around that broccoli grates on his nerves, so he puts on his best patient voice, tries to figure out what’s wrong.

“Is everything okay? You barely touched your dinner.” He asks, cutting up his steak into smaller and smaller pieces so that he has something to do, so he isn’t just staring at his son waiting for an answer.

“I’m okay.” Henry replies with a shrug, and that worries Charlie.

“You know you can talk to me right? Is it school or – ”

“I said I’m okay.” Henry interrupts him a little more forcefully, and Charlie sits up straight, mildly shocked but not too surprised.

If Charlie was in a crappy mood, why was it so out of the box to think Henry might be too? Everyone needs space, he thinks, everyone needs time to decompress – even kids. Maybe especially kids.

Definitely especially Henry.

“Alright.” Charlie nods, trying to do the right thing, be the right parent. “If you’re not hungry, you can leave the plate here and I’ll put it in a Tupperware for later, you can go do your reading.”

“I’m not doing my reading.” Henry shakes his head, defiant.

“Henry come on, you know the only way to get better is to practice – ” Charlie tries, tries tries tries to be patient, tries as his fist clenches with frustration around his fork.

“There’s no point and I’m not doing it. You can’t make me.” Henry looks at him with such clipped stubbornness that he can almost see Nicole, and it freaks him out, makes his temper start to rise.

“Look I don’t know where this attitude is coming from honey but yes, actually I can. I’m the parent and you’re the child and that means if I ask you to go do your reading so you can spell better, then that means you listen, and you do it.” Charlie says, because even though he knows things are hard, he’s not a doormat, he’s still Henry’s dad at the end of the day.

But instead of backing down, Henry crosses his arms over his chest and sits back in his seat, brows furrowed.

“Or what?” He sneers, and Charlie is now personally offended, he sets the cutlery down and waves around his confusion with his hands. 

“What’s wrong with you tonight?” Charlie demands to know, “I’m trying to help you!”

“Well maybe I don’t want your help! Maybe I don’t care!” And now Henry is raising his voice, shouting, he’s standing up and bracing his hands on the table so hard that it makes the plates clink, makes water slosh over the rim of the glass Henry hasn’t had one sip from.

“Apologize, now.” Charlie says through grit teeth, because he _really _doesn’t need this right now. He doesn’t need this on top of everything else, not when things were finally starting to get good, not now.

But Henry doesn’t care just like he said he doesn’t, and Charlie has no idea where the fuck any of this is coming from – or maybe he does, he does and he’s trying not to think about it, trying to shove it so deep so that maybe this will all go away.

“No.” Henry says, and Charlie snaps, he snaps and he’s out of his chair at the dining table in an instant, his long legs moving him over to Henry.

He slams his napkin down against the table top, yanks Henry’s chair away from where his son is already standing so that he can get close enough to pick his son up and hoist him over his shoulder.

“That’s it – fine! Fine, you don’t want to eat dinner, you don’t want to do homework, fine!” Charlie yells, face red, heart pumping, at his fucking limit, snapped, having no clue what to do he’s never done this before Henry’s never been this rebellious before. He carries Henry through the house, struggles up the stairs. “You can sit in your room and stare at the wall then for all I care!”

“Put me down! Put me down!” Henry kicks and screams and punches his fists against Charlie’s back, and though he can’t do any real damage, not really, each hit is like a bullet to Charlie’s chest.

He’s too blind with anger though, the rush of the world around him as he storms through the house. Why why why, it’s all he can repeat in his head, as Henry kicks and screams and punches Charlie in the back as he sobs, red faced and snot nosed sobs sobs sob soaking into Charlie’s shirt.

“You’re going to act like a brat I’m going to treat you like one! You’re spoiled and rotten and the last thing I need to fucking deal with today, you know that?” Charlie wrenches open Henry’s bedroom door, stomps over to the bed and drops Henry on top of it, practically shaking with rage.

“I hate you!” Henry throws himself onto his pillow, shouts and screams and cries himself hoarse, his whole body flailing as he has nowhere to send the energy but out, “I hate you! I hate you I hate you I hate you!”

“Hate me all you want, I don’t give a shit!” Charlie shouts in his direction as he leaves the room, slams the bedroom door hard, so hard it shakes the walls and he’s got tears streaming down his cheeks that he doesn’t even notice until his vision gets so blurred that he smacks into the wall of the hallway.

“I want my mom! I want mommy!” Henry’s yelling is muffled now, the noise dampened by the wall that separates them, and the pillow he’s crying into, and the rain that drowns the noise out.

But the words are loud in Charlie’s ears, and they sting, they sting so fucking much and he wants to reach down his own throat and tear his heart out because what’s the point of having it when it’s broken?

“Yeah well, I’m all you’ve got!” Charlie hears himself shouting down the hall, loud enough so that he knows Henry can hear it, even though he knows Henry doesn’t care.

And then his feet carry him to his own bedroom, where he’s slamming his own door.

“God fucking dammit!” He sits on the edge of his bed and screams into a pillow of his own, “Fuck!”

What more was he supposed to do? What the fuck else was he supposed to do like this? Wasn’t he trying his best? Didn’t Henry see that? Didn’t he see how fucking hard he was working? Charlie thought – maybe he didn’t know what the fuck he thought. Maybe he was doing the same goddamned thing he always did, assuming everyone around him felt the same way he did.

He thought if they could all pretend like nothing was wrong, maybe nothing really was wrong. Maybe Nicole leaving like this was a blessing instead of a curse. Now he knows he was wrong, he’s wrong about so much shit lately, and it eats him up inside.

He’s angry then, furious, absolutely fucking livid and he stands up and throws the pillow as hard as he can against the wall. It hits a small lamp on the dresser and knocks it over, shatters into a thousand little pieces. He doesn’t care, he always hated that lamp. He doesn’t know why it’s even still there, doesn’t know why he’s left it there for so long, for three months.

He’s exhausted, he’s so fucking tired. He yells out in general anguish and pain again before curling up on the bed and sobbing so hard that he’s sure he’ll wake up with black eyes, blood vessels bursting behind his eyelids.

What was he doing wrong, what – how could he – why did he –

_I hate you! _ _I hate you! _ _I hate you! _

Charlie wraps his arms around his knees, hugs them to his chest as the words cut him so deep. Not even when Henry was a really little kid did he ever say anything like that. Summer storms rage on outside, and Charlie feels like the charade is crumbling apart.

Of course things weren’t okay, he was selfish for thinking they were. Selfish for thinking that Henry wouldn’t have an outburst like this eventually. If he calmed down enough, he might think about how strong Henry has to be, for this to be the first time he really freaks out about Nicole leaving them, leaving him.

The kid is eight, he’s eight. Charlie has to remember that, tries to hold onto that. He’s eight, he’s still so young, he’s never had to deal with the crushing reality of life yet. Charlie wants to be sick, that his own fucking mother did that, exposed the harsh cruelty of the unfairness of life to his son.

And he hates himself, for letting her.

_Can you imagine how much I love you?  
The more I see you as years go by  
I know the only one for me can only be you  
My arms won't free you, my heart won't try_

You come home from a long day of meetings, pouring rain slamming against your car windshield. It’s so bizarre, this weather. It had put you in a sour mood, and you turn the car off when you pull up to the driveway, windshield wipers stopping. It’s sort of beautiful, the way the rain falls down the windows of your car, you think.

You look at Charlie’s house, the lights are all turned off. That’s strange, for this time of evening, normally you know your boys would be eating dinner right now. You sigh, feeling bad for having missed it, missed spending time with them. You’ve come so accustomed to it, to spending time with them over the course of the last couple months.

You hope that they’ve had a good dinner, and your stomach rumbles in its own right.

A long day of meetings that you hope will have successful outcomes behind you, you decide a big delicious dinner is the best way to cure this chill in your bones. Maybe you’ll text Charlie, see if he’s still awake, if maybe you could talk for a while together.

But all that flies out the window when you run to your front steps in the rain, when you see Henry sitting there, his knees drawn up and his head buried in his arms.

“Henry?” You immediately crouch, not caring about the rain, mind racing wondering if something happened to him, if something happened to Charlie. “What are you doing here are you alright?”

Henry just cries, and wraps his arms around your shoulders so tight that you almost knock over. You hold him and pick him up, try your best to navigate the last couple steps with this child in your arms as you unlock your front door, turn all your lights on.

“Henry, I need you to tell me what’s wrong.” You say as calmly as humanly possible, but Henry isn’t really very forthcoming.

“Can I spend the night here?” He asks around a hiccupped sob, rubbing at his red-rimmed eyes.

“Where’s your dad? Is your dad okay?” You’re nearly ready to call the police, to barge over into the house yourself.

“He’s…I don’t want to talk to him.” Henry sighs eventually, and so do you.

“Did you get into a fight?” You ask, and Henry nods, begins those cry-whines again, and you just hug him tight, hold him and rock him back and forth, speaking softly, calmly, “Okay, okay, here, let’s do this. Why don’t you go into the bathroom and get some towels and dry off, and I’ll make you some tea, and we’ll all calm down, okay?”

Henry nods, and does as he’s told.

You set the kettle to boil, not really sure of how Henry takes his tea, or if he drinks tea at all. But you have tea and lemon and honey, and you think this calls for two cubes of sugar, and you hope that after a sip or two, this child that you’ve come to care for will stop crying long enough to tell you what happened.

When Henry comes back, he’s wrapped a towel around his shoulders, and it helps even though he’s in his wet clothes. He’s even in his shoes, and there’s muddy footprints all over the floor, but you don’t care, you’ll clean them up later.

You offer him the tea, and he takes it, but he doesn’t say anything, not one word.

You sit with him on the couch, and all he wants is to be held, so you hold him, pet his hair gently as he stops crying, until he’s falling asleep.

The second that Henry’s head hits the pillow, you’re getting up and moving out of the room, pulling your phone out of your pocket and dialing his number, your heart pounding, worried he’ll be angry with you, or with the world in general.

“Charlie?” You whisper as soon as you hear the line pick up, “Honey I’m so sorry I -- Henry’s here.”

“_What?_” His voice is a little too loud with worry on the other line. 

“He’s asleep, on the couch. He ran over and wouldn’t tell me what’s wrong.” You explain in a hushed tone so you don’t wake him up and make Henry mad either.

“I’m coming, I’m on my way.” Charlie says, and you hang up.

You go outside to wait on the steps, not even bothering about the rain when you see him, when you see Charlie practically running from next door.

He looks broken, in the light from the streetlamps, and you wonder why it always has to happen on nights like this, why the bad news always waits for such dramatic weather. There’s never good timing for things like this, you know that, but still.

“Oh honey.” You open your arms to Charlie, and he squeaks out a sigh and scoops you up right there, right on the steps.

“We got into a fight.” Charlie’s voice is soft and sad, so sad, as he buries your face against his neck, wants to fit as close to your body as possible. “It was my fault, I was too tired and…he was acting out and I didn’t handle it the right way. He said he hated me.”

“I’m sorry.” Your heart breaks for him, gasping slightly at the words.

“I love you so much, I – I don’t know what the fuck I’d be doing if I didn’t have you, I don’t deserve you I’m sorry – ” Charlie is shaking around you, voice wobbling, cracking, and you’re crying because you hate to see them like this, it burns in your stomach, seeing them like this.

“Shh, hey. You’re alright. You’re both going to be alright. You have each other, and you have me when you need me. I’ll always be here.” You try to reassure him, try to find anything to say that might help, you try. “I love you so much, and I’m so sorry.”

Charlie bends down then, just enough to capture your lips in his. He kisses you, and you open your mouth for him, his tongue hot against yours, hot in the cold of the rain. You stand there, on the steps in the rain and kiss for what feels like an eternity, but neither of you move. You need this, he needs this, these kisses. They ground him, bring him back from a place of terror and free-fall.

“I…I better bring him home.” Charlie sighs against your lips, as his hands caress your cheeks, as he holds onto your face for dear life.

You nod, stepping away from him. He follows, stays in your space for a minute, before giving you a heartbreaking smile and nodding too.

He has one hand on the doorknob to go inside, but you put a hand on his shoulder to stop him for a moment.

“Charlie?” You whisper, your heart filled with so much worry and love and sadness for him. 

“Yeah?” Charlie swallows, looking terrified to go inside and face his son.

“He didn’t mean it.” You shake your head.

“Maybe he did.” Charlie looks so resigned that it hurts when he says, “I wouldn’t blame him.”

* * *

Henry is fast asleep on your couch, just like you said he was. Charlie doesn’t know how the fuck he managed to leave the house and get over to you without him hearing. Maybe it was the rain, maybe it was the loudness of his own sobs that he just didn’t hear it.

But there Henry is, and Charlie scoops him up gently, carefully, tries not to disturb him too much. Charlie steals one more kiss, a chaste kiss, from you as he passes you by, as you wave goodnight to him, worried worried worried.

Charlie gets halfway up the stairs of his own house, when Henry rubs his face against his shoulder.

“Dad?” He hears Henry ask, confused and sad.

“Hi honey, go back to sleep it’s just me.” Charlie winces, hates that he can’t even do this right, can’t do anything right anymore, can he?

But Henry just holds onto him tighter, his arms hooking around Charlie’s neck and squeezing him tight.

“I’m sorry.” Henry says, and Charlie lets out a breath he didn’t know he was even holding.

“I know, I’m sorry too.” Charlie replies.

They get to Henry’s bedroom, and Charlie sets him down softly on the bed. He wants to say something, wants to tell Henry to change into warm clothes, but his son knows better than for Charlie to have to say it, so he doesn’t.

He’s about to go, when Henry sits up in bed and asks with the smallest voice Charlie’s ever heard, “Are you going to leave?”

Charlie sits on the edge of the mattress and shakes his head, tries his best to smile warmly, tries his best to show how sorry he is.

“No, I’m not going anywhere. You can’t get rid of me that easily.” Charlie replies, shaking his head, willing himself not to cry.

“That’s why mom left isn’t it, because of the things you said? Because I’m rotten?” Henry whispers, looking down at his hands, and Charlie chews the inside of his cheeks.

“No.” He says immediately, firmly. “I didn’t mean those things that I said. I was angry, and sometimes when people are angry they say stupid things they don’t mean. I shouldn’t have said those things to you, I was wrong.”

“I was angry too. I didn’t mean it either.” Henry says, before shuffling over and hugging his dad, asking to be hugged back, and not really asking when he says too soft, “Mom’s not going to come back, is she.”

Charlie’s numb, at this point. He’s numb, he’s spent all his feelings, all his tears. He’s emotionally exhausted and he has to be honest with his son, he has to be honest with Henry, because clearly the farce of a happy circumstance had tarnished, had faded away.

“I don’t know. I wish I could tell you Henry, I really do.” Charlie hugs his son, and the rain comes down in sheets outside, and Charlie wishes things were different. “But I don’t know.”

“If she didn’t leave because of me, why did she go?” Henry asks and his voice breaks, and he’s crying into Charlie’s shirt again.

Charlie rubs Henry’s back, lets him cry, lets him be hurt. He has every right to be angry, but…but after Henry had screamed those three words at him, Charlie had begun to do some thinking, and Henry has just as much a right to be angry with Charlie as he does with Nicole.

“You want to know the truth? The truth is, she left because for so long, she was trying to be someone she wasn’t. I think…I think she was trying to be someone she thought she should be. Someone _I_ thought she should be. For so many years I thought that things were okay, and that she was happy with the life she had, but she wasn’t. She wasn’t happy, because she wasn’t being herself.”

Charlie admits, admits to himself, to his son, to the world.

“And I didn’t notice. I didn’t notice that she was unhappy, because I thought things were okay, so I didn’t ever think to look. I thought that because I was happy, and you were happy, she had to be happy too. But that’s not how people work.”

He looks outside the window, watches the rain.

Henry is quiet as he listens, his cries coming to a light sniffle, his arms still tight around Charlie’s shoulders.

“She left because I was selfish, and I ignored her unhappiness for so long that she felt the only way to be happy again, was to be herself. Except, she spent so much time being someone that I wanted her to be, that the only way she could even be herself again was to be away from me. She couldn’t stand me anymore, and so she left.”

Charlie pulls Henry back enough so that he can look his son in the eye when he speaks now, because it’s important for him to know, important for him to hear him.

“Mom loves you so much. She loves you _so_ much. And the more I think about it, the more I know that she tried for so long to make me happy, so that you could grow up with a family that felt perfect. But it wasn’t fair for me to let her do that all on her own. It wasn’t fair, and sometimes, there’s only so much that a person can take before they snap. She didn’t leave because of you, Henry. She left because of me.”

And he hates it, hates saying the truth out loud.

But it’s the truth, and Henry needs to hear it.

Charlie needs to hear it too.

“Okay.” Henry says eventually, and Charlie wonders what he’s thinking, how he’s processing any of this, if he’s processing it at all. He wonders if maybe he should get Henry a therapist, maybe he should get one for himself.

“Okay?” Charlie asks, and Henry nods. He checks the little clock in Henry’s room, it’s way too late, almost midnight, and like every other day, Charlie has work in the morning. He might call out, because he doesn’t know if he has any energy left in him to go be creative in eight hours, but he figures he’ll deal with that tomorrow. For now, he stands up, walks to Henry’s door and says, “Sleep tight honey.”

“Dad?” Henry whispers, as Charlie is about to close the door.

“Yeah Henry?” Charlie whispers back, hesitating for a minute.

“I love you.” Henry says, and the relief of those words smacks into Charlie like a freight train.

“I love you too.” Charlie nods, giving him as much of a smile as he could muster, and closing the door.

He has to cover his mouth so Henry doesn’t hear him cry, all the way down the hall to his own bedroom.

But this time, it’s tears of relief, and the thing he does before he does anything else, is pick up the phone, and call you.

_I know the only one for me can only be you  
My arms won't free you, my heart won't try_


	9. Chapter 9

_I love you for sentimental reasons_   
_I hope you do believe me_   
_I'll give you my heart_

_I love you and you alone were meant for me_   
_Please give your loving heart to me_   
_And say we'll never part_

**September**

The summer days are filled with light and joy, after that, after the big explosion between Charlie and Henry. It was an explosion which he knew was coming, had to have known was coming for some time. It feels good to have gotten all that out of the way now, Henry seems lighter for it.

Heatwaves come and go, and with them so do the lingering clutches of pain. Now the crunch of early autumn leaves snap under foot, and Henry is back to school. A new grade and a new opportunity for growth. His reading is improving significantly, as is his mood; there’s no real arguments anymore. It’s hard sometimes, because of course it’s hard, but you’re all in it together, and that makes things a little easier.

Charlie thinks back to before all of this, thinks back to how miserable he had been, trapped in a marriage he didn’t want anymore, stuck with a wife who hated him. He thinks about it, about how rough the last year had been, how cold she had been to him and how warm you were, how warm you always were.

He thinks about it; the hiding, the sneaking, the lies.

He thinks about it as you shift and turn in bed, the soft sheets kissing your naked body, dawn pouring into the bedroom and casting you into the most gorgeous pink glow Charlie’s ever seen. Birds chirp and the sounds of early morning traffic come to life, and Charlie just feels good.

There’s still hiding, sneaking, and lies. But it’s your bed now too, and that makes Charlie grin against the top of your hair as you hum out a little stretch to greet the day.

“’Morning.” Charlie’s voice is thick and syrupy to his own ears, he’s barely got his eyes open but the moment he can feel you stirring, he finds waking up a lot easier of a task.

You snuggle up closer to him, impossibly close as the little alarm on his phone rings. Charlie groans, smacks a hand over to the nightstand and unplugs it from his charger.

His burner phone lives in the bottom of a drawer somewhere now. He doesn’t need it, not really, not anymore. He isn’t living under the constant surveillance he once was, and though he can’t just be outright with you, it’s much less strict that it was before. He doesn’t save any pictures still, he’s too paranoid for that, for them saving to some cloud somewhere. But the calls, the texts, those all feel like something he can give himself, something he can give you.

His regular phone chimes and rings and clangs through the quiet of the room, and Charlie fumbles to shut it up, making you laugh out a little groan of your own. 

“How did you sleep?” He asks you, combing his fingers through your hair. He smiles, because you’re not really bothering to move away from the pillow you’ve made of his chest. It’s a steady weight, a warmth he’s wanted for so long.

“Like a baby.” You grin up at him as the early dawn of morning bathes the room in oranges now. You kiss his chin where you can reach, press your smile against his face, tickling him with your voice as you ask, “You?”

“Pretty damn good.” Charlie holds you by your hips and pulls you up the last couple inches for your lips to be level with one another, and you get the hint, rising up onto your hands and knees on top of him, his hands smoothing around your back, “But I’d much rather be awake with you.”

“Kiss me?” You grin, biting your lower lip around a smile, rubbing your nose against his as the sky goes golden from an autumn sunrise.

“I thought you’d never ask.” Charlie smiles back at you, before opening his mouth up to yours, lips parting, seeking your touch.

You settle yourself against him and kiss him for what feels like hours. Eyes closed, Charlie breathes you in, every drop of you, even the taste of your sleep-sour breath. It doesn’t bother Charlie, not one bit. He lets one of his hands clasp around the back of your neck possessively, his other hand pinching grabbing nipping down your back until he’s got a palmful of your ass and gives it a good squeeze.

He wants you, so fucking badly. But these aren’t summer days where the house sleeps in, no, there’s a schedule and as Charlie kisses you, he’s painfully aware of it. Your tongue is hot and slow against his, and it’s turning him on, the head of his cock lightly brushing against your ass from where your body is moving on top of him.

He’s got to pull you off of him soon, otherwise you’ll both be too desperate to do anything else. He groans against your lips and kisses you three more times, before making a move to sit up. You chuckle and go along with him, climbing off his lap and getting out of bed.

“What time is it?” You ask as you stretch and shake the last little remnants of sleep from your limbs.

“Too early.” Charlie replies, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed and watching you move around the room, beautifully nude.

“Better get up and dressed before he wakes up.” You hum playfully tossing a towel at Charlie’s face.

His reflexes are fast enough that he catches it no problem, and if things were different, if Henry knew you were here, Charlie could wrestle you to the bed and the sound of your laughter wouldn’t be such an alerting noise.

But as it were, Henry doesn’t know you’re here this time, he doesn’t know you’ve spent the night, so Charlie lets you get away with whatever you want, towels being thrown at his face included.

“He’s old enough to make himself breakfast now, don’t you think?” Charlie’s never been the most morning person around, but the sight of you walking towards the master bath that’s connected to his room has him feeling playful in his own way.

“Are you going to shower with me or do I have to be all alone, soaking wet, covered in suds and -- !” You start, before he’s rushing after you and smacking your ass with that towel, making you cover your mouth so your laugh doesn’t ring through the quiet of morning, as he chases you into the bathroom.

* * *

It’s not long after a little joint-jerk-off session in the shower, that you’re coming back from your house in a fresh pair of clothes, hair done up and chipper. You let yourself in with the key that’s gotten so much use Charlie’s almost worried it’ll wear out, and make a beeline for the kitchen.

School mornings are pretty fast-paced, and it isn’t long before Henry is bounding down the stairs when he smells the brew of coffee – a tell tale sign that you’re here.

“Good morning Henry!” You smile at him, he’s all ready for the day except for his shoes which wait by the front door. Henry’s gotten better at figuring out what clothes go together, and he’s in this very sweet stage where he’s trying to emulate Charlie, so he’s wearing a little button down that’s maybe too big for him.

“Hi (Y/N), whatcha making?” He comes over to you but you put a hand out to stop him from getting too close to the stove as you turn the heat on and grab a pan.

“_We_ are making scrambled eggs, can you help me and get the cheese from the fridge?” You correct, and his eyes light up at the prospect of being a helper and also because he loves scrambled eggs.

“Can I have mine like dad gets?” Henry asks from the fridge as he rifles through the shelves to find the bags of pre-shredded cheese from the grocery store.

“Are you sure? He likes his more runny than you do.” You’re pleasantly surprised, like most kids Henry was a picky eater. 

“Yeah I’m sure, I wanna try.” Henry nods, coming back over with an assortment of cheeses and dumping them on the counter.

You begin cracking a couple eggs into a bowl and whisking them up with a pinch of salt, a good handful of pepper jack and cheddar just the way you know the boys like it. Henry hovers behind you standing on his tip-toes to try and look over your shoulder because you won’t let him too close to the stove as you swirl the runny eggs around and around with butter.

“I’m very proud of you for being open minded to trying something new kiddo. And if you don’t like it, I can always cook them a little bit more.” You smile over your shoulder at him and he gets embarrassed from being caught, right at the same time Charlie finally descends in a nice freshly pressed suit.

“Morning dad! (Y/N) and I are making eggs, look.” Henry beckons Charlie over and you can’t help but chuckle a little from his excitement.

“I see, good that you’re being a helper. What can I do, want me to make pancakes?” He asks you, because now that you’re back and there’s coffee in the pot ready for him to pour, and eggs are scrambled he feels like he could be a morning person, he could be a morning person with you.

“Yes! We can use the blueberries.” Henry pipes up, answers his question even though he wasn’t asked.

The blueberries in question were just picked up last weekend at the farmer’s market. It had become a bit of a tradition, you and Henry going to the farmer’s market on Sundays. Sundays Charlie had been working in the theater, taking an extra day to make sure rehearsals were going well, making sure Tom & Jerry were liking what the troupe was doing.

It reminded Charlie of the old days, where he’d call you to watch Henry during his meetings, when he’d ask you to babysit for long rehearsal nights. Every time he came back, you and Henry had found a whole array of treasures, from fresh produce to interesting art pieces and crafts that Charlie had begun to display.

But these blueberries were huge, and even though Charlie hadn’t been there to pick them out, he was excited to taste their sweetness. Charlie smiles at the domestic bliss of it all, goes to the fridge to get the little carton.

“Set the table please, hot pans over here.” He tells his son, and Henry groans and rolls his eyes playfully as he does as he’s told.

The minute that Henry’s out of the room, Charlie steps next to you and begins whipping up the box mix of pancakes for the sake of time, accidentally or maybe not so accidentally bumping your hip with his as you work on scrambled eggs right beside him.

“He’s in an adventurous mood lately.” You remark, gesturing with your spatula to the dining room.

“I know I don’t know what’s gotten into him but I’m glad.” Charlie replies, because he really is glad that his son is starting to develop a more adult palette, and isn’t just demanding sweets for breakfast every morning. Charlie looks around, makes sure Henry isn’t coming back and quickly steals a kiss from your smiling cheek. “You want pancakes too?”

“If you don’t mind.” You nod, taking the eggs out, a perfectly creamy buttery cheesy consistency. 

“I don’t, any chance to stay next to you a little longer I’m going to take.” Charlie replies, and you have you nearly duck your head from your own blush.

“You’re such a charmer.” You shake your head, scooping the eggs out of a pan and putting them into a serving bowl.

“Oh I’m more than that.” Charlie’s voice drops as he flips a pancake, leans down to your ear and whispers, “I took the day off work, when I drop Henry off I’m coming straight back to you.”

“Yeah?” A slow smile begins to spread across your face, as you stick the pan in the sink to be dealt with later.

Charlie reaches out to you and you go to him, cross the little kitchen and let his arm wind around your waist. His lips tickle your ear when he nuzzles his face near your cheek.

“Yeah, and when I step through that door, I’ll be very upset if you’re not naked and waiting for me in bed.” He says, and there’s that deep dark quality to his voice that reminds you so much of the very beginnings of this affair, the beginnings of his wanton desire for you.

“I’d never want to upset you, Mr. Barber.” You whisper, and Charlie nearly breaks out into goosebumps from it, from the way you’re able to flip that switch inside him so easily.

And then you’re stepping away, walking the bowl of eggs into the dining room where Henry is waiting patiently. Charlie smiles to himself, flips another pancake off the griddle, and he’s not too far behind.

* * *

Charlie doesn’t carry too much stuff anymore, when he walks Henry to school. Now he always has a free hand for his son to hold when they cross the streets, they leave with enough time that Charlie doesn’t have to scramble to make it to the theater. Henry doesn’t have to run to keep up with him, and instead of protests, Henry chatters away about all the gossip and news around his school, in his class.

“You’ve got everything you need, right?” Charlie asks as they approach the brick wall that Charlie knows is the start of the school property.

“Ugh dad, that was one time!” Henry rolls his eyes, and they check both ways before going through the crosswalk.

“I know but accidents happen, it’s okay.” Charlie says anyway, careful of his footing as he approaches that uneven part of the sidewalk. “Watch the lip.”

“Are we doing anything this weekend?” Henry asks, completely ignoring him in that way kids do sometimes when they’re wrapped up in their own heads.

“No, what did you have in mind?” Charlie asks back, the two of them stopping in front of the school.

“I was invited to Edgar’s birthday party and I really really want to go they’re going to have a bounce-house.” Henry replies, and that makes Charlie smile because honestly a bouncy house sounds like a pretty fun time.

“If you give me the invitation I’ll make sure you get there honey. We have to get him a present, start thinking of something he might like, okay?” Charlie makes sure that Henry’s backpack and coat and everything are on him and that his shoelaces are tied because he’s that kind of parent, and Henry laughs, shrugging his dad’s hands away.

“Okay – are we still going to go to the park after school?” Henry asks, right as the bell rings and all the other kids start walking a little faster to get up the stairs.

“If the weather stays nice we will. Okay, have a good day!” Charlie gives Henry a hug right as some of Henry’s friends run up the stairs. 

“I love you dad.” Henry hugs Charlie back quickly before wrangling out of his hold and joining his buddies, the group of them happy to be reunited after a whole night of not seeing each other.

“Love you too honey!” Charlie calls after Henry, smiling, glad that his son is doing alright, glad that everyone’s alright.

_I think of you every morning_   
_Dream of you every night_   
_Darling, I'm never lonely_   
_Whenever you are in sight_

When he comes back home, he closes and locks the door behind him, steps out of his shoes and hangs his coat up. He puts his keys in the dish by the door, and runs a hand through his hair, and then looks up and sees you, standing at the foot of the stairs, completely in the nude.

“I thought I told you to wait in bed.” Charlie grins, drinking in the sight of your body in the morning sun. It’s only a little after seven o’clock, he’s got so much time – fuck he’s got all day to spend with you, and your body is so inviting, the way that it’s posing so seductively for him.

“Maybe I wanted to wait for you here.” You shrug one shoulder, being difficult, doing whatever you want.

Charlie will always let you do whatever you want, and you know, you grin, flash him your teeth.

“It’s not fair, to tease a man like this.” Charlie takes a few slow steps towards you, and you take a few steps backwards up the stairs in response. He shakes his head with a smile, licks across his front teeth, wants you.

“It’s only teasing if I don’t let you take me.” You lick your lips, muscles in your breast twitching and drawing his attention immediately, drawing his gaze to the way your nipples are perked up and begging to be pinched, bitten.

“Are you?” He asks, growing hard in his slacks, stepping closer closer closer, “Are you going to let me?”

You only turn around, crook a finger to beckon him forward, and it’s a race to see who can get to the bedroom faster.

He practically tears at his clothes, his crisp button down and suit jacket, his slacks. He hops out of each leg as you roll onto the mattress with a laugh, the bed frame bouncing as he joins you, as he covers your body with his own, stripped down as quickly as he can to nothing but his socks.

He goes dizzy for a second, because the rush of blood from his head to his dick is so fast that he huffs out a groan as you contort your body into all these alluring shapes, soft colors of your skin in the sun blending together, making him so fucking hard.

“You’re so gorgeous, you know that? Look at this, look at you. I should get a mirror and stick it on the ceiling so you can watch me fuck you, watch all the slutty faces you make when you’re drooling for my dick.” Charlie’s voice is deep yet insistent, as he wedges a hand between your thighs.

“Touch me, touch me please I need you.” You pin your wrists up over your head, letting them clutch at the pillow while he drinks in the sight of you.

He doesn’t know what he wants from you first, there’s so much he wants to do with you, so many ways he wants to make you feel good, to feel good with you.

“Spread your fuckin’ legs,” He settles on, because his cock is really aching for you, his whole body aches for you, yearns for the pleasure that only you can provide. Your knees fall apart and his hand slides against your slit, already so wet. “That’s it, there’s that pretty pussy.”

You nod, and you let out a breathy moan as he curls two fingers inside you, pushes them past the slight resistance of your body and up against the tight wet heat of your walls. He sits back a little because he loves the sight of it, loves watching his body disappear into yours, watching you take him so well, watching you want him.

“Your cunt just swallows me up, doesn’t it,” Charlie groans as your pussy squeezes around his fingers, his thumb lazily stroking teasing circles around your clit that makes your cunt drip with slick, slick that’s only letting him finger you deeper, “It’s practically begging for these fingers.”

“Your hands, oh they’re so big.” You moan, hands gripping the pillow, back arching enough that your pretty tits push out.

“Bigger than my cock?” Charlie bends you then, fingers you nice and slow, gets you worked up. He loves it when you’re worked up, loves it when you’re blissed out from a well earned orgasm, or two, or three, or or or.

“No – no nothing’s bigger than your cock.” You sigh out happily, voice like liquid gold, like velvet as he licks up a stripe between your tits, kisses at your nipples.

“Hmmm, if you want it you’re going to have to beg for it.” He pretends to think, pretends that he doesn’t know exactly what he’s doing, giving you exactly what you want to hear.

He thrusts his fingers in and out of your cunt until he knows you’re good and stretched for him. He’s bigger than average, bigger than most, he knows. He doesn’t ever want to hurt you, and he takes the foreplay very seriously. He fingers you, and kisses licks bites sucks at your tits, until your chest heaves from pleasure and your throat clicks as you moan.

“Can I have it, please? Please Charlie I’ll do anything – anything you want if you fuck me with that big cock of yours, come in me, all over me I don’t care just give it to me.” You demand, a needy selfish brat that he adores, that he wants to please, that he’ll give anything to just the same.

“What if I fuck you all day, hm? Make you sticky all over, come in you so hard that you taste it.” He listens to the sick squelch of your cunt around his fingers as you just get wetter and wetter, desperate for something more filling, desperate for anything to really satisfy that urge.

“Charlie, yes, please!” Your legs bend and straighten, thighs trembling as your hips rise, as you egg him on, encourage him, beg for him, pleas rolling off your tongue like the easy whore you are for him. “Please, please give me that, come in me, make me smell like you.”

Without any warning he pulls his fingers out of you and lines his cock up, pushes it all the way in with one sharp thrust, one that punches out a high whine, a gasp, a moan all mixed up into one, tears it from your throat as you smile so wide, getting what you want, spoiled and greedy and all his, all Charlie’s.

“Oh baby you’re so tight, didn’t I fuck you enough last night? You sweet needy thing, I’ll fill you up.” He grunts as his hips begin to thrust, begin building a fast rhythm that’s got his eyes shut tight, already wanting to drool from the pleasure of it.

“I need it, oh my god.” Your hands dig into his shoulders, feeling the way his muscles move and flex above you as his hips shove themselves right up against yours, his cock splitting you into a thousand pieces.

It’s incredible, it’s intoxicating, the velvet blazing hot grip your cunt has on his cock feels so good, makes him sweat. Your body wraps around his as you try to get impossibly closer, moving and writhing and taking this pounding, taking it so well as he pulls his cock all the way out only to slam it back in.

“You like that? Like feeling me inside you – feel how hard it is?” Charlie’s jaw is clenched from pleasure and he alternates between holding himself up and grabbing at your body, his hips rocking the bed, shaking the headboard, making it smack against the wall from how fast he’s railing you.

“Don’t stop don’t you dare fucking stop – oh, oh yes!” You shout, head thrown back in pleasure as you claw at his shoulders with your nails, as your legs hook around his hips and push his ass, the back of his thighs closer to you, your tits bounce, your mouth is dropped open and all that comes out are yelled curses.

“You’re so loud, shouting out my name, call my name baby.” Charlie grunts, pinches your nipple and tweaks it hard as he angles himself better to get your gspot stimulated at the same time. He searches for it, the head of his cock nudging up hard against your walls.

“Charlie!” You gasp loud loud loud as he finds it, as he grinds his dick against it over and over, making your back arch, your toes curl, your cunt grip him so tight, “Charlie please!”

“I bet all our neighbors can hear you, I bet they all know what a dirty little slut you are.” He pants, his cock throbbing, aching for you, sliding against the wet wet wet heat of your walls. His dick is so sensitive, and with each drag of the head of his cock in and out of your body, he feels like he can’t suck down air fast enough, not even from your lungs, and he tries.

“Yours, all y—oh shit—all yours.” Your body shakes shudders trembles under him as he kisses you deeply, passionately, sloppy.

His hand slides from your nipple to your clit, and he gathers up some of the slick that’s made your inner thighs go nice and shiny, smears it between his fingers and uses it to lube up your clit as he pushes hard and fast circles, zig-zags, back and forth motions times with his thrusts that have you _screaming _his name.

“That’s – that’s fucking right, you’re mine, my whore,” He encourages, bites down hard on the spot where your shoulder meets your neck, “I bet they’re touching themselves thinking of you, listening to you get pounded, I bet they wish they could hear this pussy weep for me.”

“Ch—Charlie!” You shout, tears starting to collect in your eyes as you gush around his cock, soak through to the sheets, soaking through into his heart, his soul, his cock.

“Shh baby, it’s okay, it’s okay, let go.” Charlie’s not far behind.

Your eyes roll back into your head as your pussy pulses, sucking him in just like it did his fingers, coming still. Your teeth chatter a little as your body jolts with pleasure, and that’s so fucking hot that he comes hard in you, hips slamming against yours one final time before he blows his load into your waiting body, pelvis flush against yours as your legs fall limp onto the mattress.

He comes and pants hard, grunting and groaning out his orgasm as your pussy milks him for what he’s worth. His arms are a cage above you, beads of sweat drip down from the tip of his nose and he’s so grateful that it’s turtleneck season because your throat is a series of beautiful blooming bruises that he put there.

The sight of the markings, _his _markings, his claiming of you, makes more come force itself out of his cock, and Charlie winces, moans and sighs against you as sparks of his own pleasure snap up his spine.

“Mmm, I’m not done with you yet, not yet.” Charlie presses the words into your cheek, kisses you with swollen lips, licks at the corner of your mouth as his hips slowly grind against yours, still not having pulled out. “I’m still hard – roll over for me?”

You’re boneless, but you try your best. He pulls out to give you enough space to flop over onto your stomach, and he grabs his pillow from the other side of the bed, uses it to prop your hips up. Your arms fold under your own pillow and you mouth at the soft cotton pillow case, wetting it with your spit as he slowly slowly slowly slides his cock back into your pussy from behind.

“Oh,” You sigh happily, “God that feels good.”

“Not too much?” Charlie nibbles on the shell of your ear as you take a great deal of energy to wriggle your ass up against his crotch.

“You’re never too much, I never get enough of you.” You moan as he plugs you full of his come, as he fucks it back into you from where it was threatening to spill down your thighs in a steady stream of sticky white.

“Relax for me baby, relax, feel good?” Charlie takes you slowly now, takes his time. He got out his pent up tension and stress, this is about dragging out another orgasm from you nice and easy.

He kneels behind you, your legs bent on either side of his thighs as he rocks his dick into you. Each time he pulls out he sees your come mingling with his, and he’s _so _fucking thankful that you decided to go on the pill, so thankful that he lets you have this, this gorgeous sight of your pussy drooling his come.

He’s going to give you more, because he’s got so much more to give, and your body accepts it so willingly, it’s enough to make him cry. He smacks your ass because he can, because it’s right here in front of him, and your toes curl and flex. He does it again, and you moan, making out half-way delirious with your pillow.

“So good, you’re so good to me.” You sigh, moan, eyes closed and reveling in the way his cock stuff all his come back into you, the smack of it filling the room.

“You tired?” Charlie asks with a smile, he’s got so much planned for you, he’s going to eat you out for hours, he wants you to ride him, he wants to so much with you, but even as he’s fucking you, he can’t help but think how nice it is to simply sleep beside you too.

“Yeah, but don’t stop, don’t stop – go slow, fuck me slow.” You mumble as you meet him for every careful thrust; and that alone makes Charlie’s own head tip back, like he’s looking up, up at the heavens, thanking them for giving him such an angel as you.

“You’re so wet, I love the sound your pussy makes for me, it drives me crazy.” Charlie murmurs as he rocks into you slow and sweet, feeling your cunt pulse and flutter around him. There’s a steady stream of his own come that’s oozing out of you that he just can’t fit, and that’s okay, he likes knowing you’re stuffed full to the brim.

“I like you when you’re crazy – oh, _oh_.” You moan, and he takes the opportunity of your open mouth to slip a few fingers against your tongue.

Something about the soft rasp of your mouth sucking on his fingers, coupled with the tight clench of your pussy has Charlie’s chest on fire. You suck on those fingers and moan around them, and his stomach quivers, his thighs shake as he fucks your hot cunt lazily, with more restraint that he really has.

“Touch yourself for me, let me feel you come around me again.” Charlie says, voice even and steady somehow, somehow despite being so close to coming himself again.

And you do, you bring yourself over that edge a second time, and this time it’s more of a slow build, a wash over Charlie’s nerves as he pushes somehow more come into you. He knows he’ll need a break in a minute, his balls have to be empty by now, his cock finally beginning to soften as it throbs inside you.

He sits back and stills his hips, watches as his dick just twitches as he pulls out an inch, just enough to watch himself drain his come into your body.

“Keep this safe for me, you got that? Keep it safe, all of it.” Charlie lets a hand slide underneath you, caressing your stomach, rubbing circles there.

“Mhm, fill me up.” You nod, so tired, lazy and blissed out, your eyes not even bothering to open.

He pulls out for the second time, but this time he rolls over next to you on the mattress, collects you in his arms as his cock softens. Despite his demands, your thighs grow slippery with an overflow of come, it drips down onto Charlie’s side where you sling a leg over his, tangling your limbs together as you both try and catch your breath.

“Shit.” Charlie huffs out a laugh, a pleasure weak hand coming to scrub up at his face.

“What?” You hum out a smile, kissing his ribs.

“We promised to take Henry to the park after class, remember?” Charlie winds his arms around you, holds you close to him as the birds chirp outside, still morning, still sunny.

“Yeah?” You’re confused, having a bit of trouble to catch his meaning, being so blissed out and comfortable.

“Are you going to be able to walk?” He asks, looking down at you with serious concern.

“Shit.” You echo with a frown, not even thinking about that, before looking back up at Charlie.

The two of you chew your lips for a second, before bursting out into bright happy laughter, especially when he rolls over you and smothers you into the mattress, making you complain playfully that you’re right in the wet spot, dammit!

Oh well, Charlie thinks, he’s got plenty of hours left in the day with with you – hours to make you come, laugh, sigh, shout his name, and recover with time to spare.

* * *

Hours, laughter and many many orgasms later, you and Charlie shower, change, and are trying desperately to not act so pleased around the rest of the world as you walk through Central Park with Henry. True to his word, Charlie brought everyone to the park after school let out for the day. The weather was perfect for a long walk – or in Henry’s case, a run – down the pathways.

“Dad can we get a dog?” He asks after saying goodbye and thank you to a friendly golden retriever whose owner let Henry pet after he asked politely.

“No I don’t think that’s a good idea right now.” Charlie shakes his head with an apologetic smile, walking so close to you that you might as well be arm in arm, hand in hand. “But you know, maybe in our next house we can get a dog.”

“We’re moving?” Henry asks with a confused arch of his brow.

“Not today or anything, but we’re going to have to move eventually.” Charlie thinks out loud, knowing that they’ve already sort of outgrown their space. Charlie mostly wants to be done with it, with the way it still reminds him of Nicole. “But that’ll be nice, won’t it? We can start fresh and paint the walls any color we want.”

“Can the kitchen be green?” Henry asks the both of you, and Charlie grins, glad for his excitement.

“Sure, why not.” Charlie looks at you with so much love in his eyes, because your kitchen is green, and that’s always been something Henry never shuts up about, whenever you used to babysit him at your place.

“And then can we get a dog?” Henry tries, making you laugh a little at how persistent he could be.

“_Maybe _if you can prove to me that you’re responsible and will take care of the dog, yes we can get one.” Charlie very hesitantly says, before waving a hand around, “But I’m telling you right now if me or (Y/N) has to pick up the slack it’s not going to happen, okay? That’s not fair.”

“I’ll be responsible I promise! I promise dad.” Henry skips around, making his sneakers light up on the paved path, “I’ll be the most responsible that you’ve ever seen.”

“Okay okay.” Charlie chuckles, and you stop in your tracks, which makes them stop too.

“Hey do you guys smell that?” You look around for a second, “I think we’re right near Pizza Pete’s! I’m starving, how about I get us a couple slices?”

Henry immediately begins jumping around, always thrilled at the prospect of pizza.

“You want any help?” Charlie asks, but you shake your head, knowing it’s only maybe a ten minute walk. You were always such a fast walker, the pizza would be perfectly warm by the time you got back, not so burning hot in the way cheese could sometimes be.

“Nah, I’ll be right back.” You say, adjusting your purse on your shoulder and ruffling Henry’s hair. “Don’t wait up for me, I’ll find you!”

Charlie watches you leave, your boots carrying you down one of the side paths out of the park, leaving just Charlie and Henry together. He knew what you were doing, giving them space like this. You did it sometimes, wanting to make sure you never overwhelmed them with your presence – as if you could ever overwhelm Charlie.

“Hey Henry…” He knows, and he appreciates it, because he’s had something he’s wanted to ask Henry, and he feels that talks like these are easier when it’s just them. “I was hoping you and me could talk for a minute.”

“Oh boy.” Henry groans playfully, and Charlie’s glad that he’s in good spirits, glad he’s in a good mood.

“Hey,” He lightly swats at Henry’s arm as they wander over to an empty bench, sitting down next to each other and watching people go by. “I just. I just wanted to make sure you’re doing okay. I don’t want us to have another fight, so I know it’s uncomfortable but I gotta ask and make sure.”

“Yeah, I’m okay dad.” Henry says with a small smile, and Charlie can’t help but feel sad about how fast his son’s had to grow up from all this, how strong he’s had to be in the wake of Nicole’s leave.

“Because if there’s something bothering you, I want you to know you can talk to me, or to (Y/N), or if you feel like you want someone else – ” Charlie starts, but Henry shakes his head, cuts him off at the mere suggestion of a therapist.

“I don’t want anyone else, I’m okay, really.” He nods, putting his hands in his hoodie’s front pocket, his feet swinging from where they don’t quite reach the floor, sitting on the bench. “Are you okay?”

“It’s not your job to worry about me honey.” Charlie gives a soft smile, pats his shoulder.

“I know.” Henry shrugs. He doesn’t look up at his dad, “But I still do.”

Charlie taps Henry’s shoulder to get his attention, and the kid looks so much older than almost-nine, that it kills him.

“I’m okay.” Charlie puts as much sincerity into his words as he can.

“Do you like (Y/N)?” Henry asks out of nowhere, making Charlie freeze.

“…What?” He slowly asks, blinking, trying not to seem suspicious and failing spectacularly.

“You know, like.” Henry looks around to make sure you’re not there, and then he leans over to Charlie, cups a hand over his ear. “Do you like her. Like her like her, I mean.”

“What makes you think that?” Charlie’s heart beats in his throat as he tries to be aloof, frowning, mind racing, palms starting to sweat as a litany of curses string together in his mind, nothing but _shit shit shit shit how the fuck does he know does he know did he hear did he see something did he -- _

“I dunno. You’re happier when she’s around. You’re a really bad pretender dad, it’s embarrassing how much you smile when she’s around.” Henry doesn’t sound accusatory, doesn’t sound angry about it. He sounds embarrassed more than anything, but then he sounds hopeful when he asks, “Things are better with her, I think, aren’t they?”

“I think so. Are _you _happier when she’s around?” Charlie asks back, because he has to always put Henry first, has to always make sure that Henry’s happiness comes first.

Henry mulls over his words for a little while, and Charlie wonders if it’s hard, trying to express emotions he’s not had the experience for yet, doesn’t have the words for yet.

“Yeah. I miss mom a lot, but (Y/N) is…she’s good, isn’t she? I like her, I like that she’s with us.” Henry says, and there’s an honesty in his voice that has Charlie tearing up, has his heart thud thud thudding in his chest.

“Do you think maybe, one day she could move in with us and be around all the time?” Charlie all but whispers, not believing that he’s even saying these words out loud.

“You _do_ like her!” Henry calls out triumphantly, and Charlie immediately scrambles to pull the brim of Henry’s beanie down onto his face to get him to be quiet, making him laugh.

“Shh!” Charlie tries, but to no avail.

“I knew it.” His son is so smug, so smug that it’s almost unbearable. “You should ask her out, take her on a date.”

He snorts a laugh then, because oh if only this kid knew. Actually, no hopefully he never knows, never finds out the real truth of it all. But damn, what sort of irony was this?

“It’s not that easy Henry.” He settles on eventually, which isn’t a lie, that part.

“How come?” Henry asks, always full of questions, questions that Charlie can’t answer, can’t find some way to sugar coat it for him, can’t find a way to break that fall.

“Because of mom, I’m still married to mom.” He sighs, and Henry frowns, as if he somehow hadn’t realized that.

“Oh.” Henry says very quietly, his face scrunched up the same way it does when he’s come across a word in his books that he doesn’t understand. “But…but if she’s not coming back, then why – ”

“Because she could come back, and she would be very upset if she found out. And it would be very bad if we were upset.” Charlie’s chest pangs with horrible guilt, wishing beyond belief that things were different, that he had any say at all in the separation, in any of this.

But he doesn’t, and life doesn’t ever work out the way anyone wants, and Charlie’s just lucky to have Henry and to have you.

“I still think you should ask her out.” Henry hops off of the bench and holds out a hand, waiting expectantly for his dad to take it, “One day.”

“Okay.” Charlie groans dramatically, pretending to be old and have stiff bones until Henry is laughing again, smiling again. “Maybe one day I will.”

_I love you for sentimental reasons_   
_I hope you do believe me_   
_I've given you my heart_

* * *

A few days go by, since his talk with Henry at the park. It feels good to be even a shred of honest with his son, even though he isn’t really, not fully. He doesn’t know if he ever will, about that. The affair will be one of those dark secrets that you pretend never happened, something you and Charlie will take to your graves.

That little admission, that little truth of liking you feels better to have said out loud. Henry likes knowing, Charlie thinks. He thinks Henry likes having a secret with his dad all their own, so many adults have so many secrets. Charlie doesn’t try to dwell on it too much, tries to keep things light.

But every now and again, Henry will give a smug smile, or an encouraging glance to Charlie when you’re around, and he has to pretend that he’s got no idea what Henry’s on about. You think it’s so endearing, because of course Charlie told you, but you’re good, you play along and pretend to be none the wiser.

Charlie is dropping Henry off at school once again, checking his coat, his laces. The bell has rung, and Henry’s friends are waiting, and in his backpack are birthday invitations of Henry’s own, a weekend party at the go-kart place that Henry is so excited about.

“Have a good day honey!” Charlie waves to Henry as he bounds up the steps.

“Bye dad – love you!” Henry calls over his shoulder as he meets up with his pals.

“Love you too I’ll be here to pick you up right after class, okay?” Charlie keeps waving, until a twinkling laugh grates his ears. He turns and sees a woman sticking her hands into her coat pockets. Charlie collects himself and stands up from the crouched position he’d been in to hug his son and asks, “What?”

“Nothing, it’s just sweet. Don’t see many handsome single fathers dropping the kids off these days.” The woman is clearly trying to pull something, trying to flirt. “Definitely don’t see many kids shouting out _I love you_s.”

“I do my best.” Charlie tries his best not to grimace, the last thing he wants is a war with someone on the PTA or something.

“You’re Charlie Barber, right? I recognize you from the newspaper. Broadway, or something right?” She smiles at him, tucks a lock of her hair behind her ear in a way that he thinks is supposed to be alluring.

“Or something.” Charlie mutters, looking around, trying to find some escape. He sees the little coffee shop, the one he brought Henry to, the one he used to bring you to too. “If you’ll excuse me.”

He crosses the street just in time before the little red hand begins to flash, and he thinks he’s safe behind the security of the glass door as it closes behind him, when instead he’s faced with a ghost in front of him.

“Oh my god.” He can’t help himself from saying, stunned, trying to blink away this apparition.

“Hi Charlie.” She says, and he almost can’t look at her, his stomach immediately churning.

“What the fuck are you doing here.” He feels his knees start to give out from under him, before he completely registers some tall strong and handsome LA meat-head standing next to her, his mouth going dry, mind spiraling, reeling, panicking, “Who the fuck is he?”

“I’m here to give you these.” The man says, handing over a manilla folder filled with what has to be divorce papers.

“And _I’m_ here to take my son.” She says just as coldly, as casually.

And Charlie wants to scream and shout and rage and throw a fucking fit, because for the first time in six months, he’s standing in front of Nicole.


	10. Chapter 10

_If I should lose you, the stars would fall from the skies_

_If I should lose you, the leaves would wither and die_

_The birds in May time would sing a lonely refrain_

_And I would wander around hating the sound of rain_

_With you beside me, no wind in winter would blow_

_With you beside me, a rose would bloom in the snow_

_I gave you my love but I was living a dream_

_And living would seem in vain if I lost you_

You’re anxious, while you wait. There’s a little coffee shop near the courthouse, and you’re tucked away in a corner of it. You’ve got a window seat, a good view for when Charlie comes down the steps across the street. It’s the last day of this, the last day of the trial. The lawyers told Charlie, and Charlie told you, that when he comes out of that building it’ll all be over, one way or another.

You’ve got your laptop on the table in front of you, an empty cup of coffee you keep wanting to refill but don’t. You don’t think your nerves could handle any more caffeine, not right now. Not when you’re here by yourself, no one to talk to to distract the jitters from your feet as they do their best not to tap.

Despite the jitters and the anxiety of the outcome of the case, you can’t help but smile a bit into the last remnants of foam that collect at the bottom of the cup. It feels all too familiar, feels like back then, back before all of this, back when you and Charlie started this whole thing, this whole affair.

It seems like ages ago, a lifetime ago, that you and Charlie began meeting one another in secret. How long had it really been, you wonder? When was the first time? The theater -- the kiss, was it then? Or was it all the coffee dates in cafes like this one, where sweet saxophone music and bass guitar fill the air. Maybe it was the parties you only went to if you knew the other would be there, wanting nothing more than to catch a glimpse at one another, wanting nothing more than an excuse to be close, to smile and laugh at the jokes you tell. Maybe still it was the simple act of babysitting, of Charlie wanting you around and you wanting to be too.

You sit back in the coffee shop and think about how long it’s been, how long you two knowingly sought the comfort of each other’s bodies, company, laughter and love. Two months of the divorce, six months of Nicole’s departure, and a year before that.

A year of loving him in secret before _that_.

You feel guilty, guilty for the whole thing. Guilty for loving this man who you know you shouldn’t have, guilty for not feeling guilty enough. Selfish was the theme of the divorce, wasn’t it? You were selfish too, loving Charlie. Loving him the way you do.

But how could you not? How could you not love him, when he was so charming and intelligent and kind to you? How could you not fall for this man, when he was handsome and funny and caring and _genuine. _That always struck you about Charlie, you think with a smile as you swirl the foam around in the cup, Charlie had always been so genuine.

You think back, since you’ve got nothing but time to kill, think back to how it all started, how it got to the point that it did, to the point where you’re staring out the window hoping for a happy face, hoping for a smile on the man that you love.

* * *

It started in a grocery store, you remember. It had been a beautiful day and you took the opportunity to get some errands accomplished, errands that you never had the energy for when it’s gloomy because you’d rather spend the day watching a rainy-day film. But the sun was out, and so were you, out and about running all over town, your last stop being the grocery store.

You run into him, literally. Your head is down staring at the little list of things you need, and you’re too caught up in your own concentration, and your body collides with someone else’s so significantly that you drop the little notepad and pen in your shock.

“Oh shit I’m so sorry – !” You gasp, immediately wincing in embarrassment.

“Hi, fuck sorry, here you dropped – ” You hear a deep voice, the warmth of someone standing too close, bending down to pick up the notepad.

“Here I can get it, hold on – ” You go to pick it up, your hands reaching for the little pad at the same time.

Only then is when you look up at him, at this poor guy you’ve knocked into, and as if you weren’t embarrassed enough, it just had to be the handsome man from next door. You both stand up, still apologizing over one another, smiling awkwardly.

He doesn’t take his hand off the notepad, not yet, and you remember thinking how flustered that made you, even before you really knew him, he made you flustered. 

“Hi.” You manage, hating how it sounds to your own ears.

You’re both finally realizing where you are – right in the middle of the grocery store, and now people are looking at you because you’re kind of blocking the way, and people with their baskets and carts are trying to move around you, so you move too.

“Wait!” Charlie stops you suddenly, and you turn, beckon him over to you so you can stand closer to the side. He moves towards you easily, almost subconsciously, as he runs a hand through his hair and squares his shoulders subtly. “You’re (Y/N), right? From next door.”

“Yeah that’s me. Mr. Barber?” You try and act casual, as if you hadn’t been so curious about him for the whole month that he’s lived next to you, as if you didn’t do your research and figure out who he was, who his family was.

“Call me Charlie, please.” He corrects you, and you nod, duck your head a little in residual embarrassment.

If this were anyone else, you might have already moved on with your life, might’ve searched for cover in the bakery section and avoided that particular shopper for the rest of your trip to the grocery store – but you knew him, sort of. You couldn’t just give a cold shoulder.

So instead you try and turn the situation into a positive one, and take a peek inside his cart. It’s all fresh and perfectly ripe, and is exactly the fruits that you’ve come to this section of the grocery store for.

“I like your taste in produce, Charlie.” You offer, and he practically beams at you for it.

“I’ll be honest, I picked it up because of you.” He rubs the back of his neck, gestures to the contents of his cart. “I’ve been dreaming of that pie you made.”

And that makes _you _beam, the thought that a month later he’s still hung up on your welcoming dish, a little something made with love from the heart. You had no idea who it was that was moving into the neighborhood, you didn’t keep up with any of the corner-gossip, it really was just a gesture that you wanted to make, a way to be neighborly.

Who the fuck knew the neighbor in question would be so wonderful?

“Oh I’m so glad you liked it! I was worried.” You grin at him, can’t help but smile, feeling so pleased. “New people, new preferences, you know. The last thing I wanted to do was make a poor impression.”

“Consider me impressed.” Charlie smiles right back a you, and you find yourself enamored with it, with his crooked teeth and the ways his eyes scrunch up around the corners. He’s got dimples, you think, and he’s so handsomely speckled, little moles and freckles all over that you could stare at forever. He looks around for a moment, chews on his lip and asks, “Are you here by yourself?”

“Yeah, I make a real thing out of doing the groceries. Going up and down all the aisles, seeing what the weekly sales are, all that.” You explain, wetting your lips briefly, trying not to look casual, to not be so interested that it would come across as inappropriate, “What about you?”

“Me too -- I mean, I’m alone too.” Charlie stumbles over his sentence, and you smile at how he gets the most beautiful blush across his cheeks. “I’m really just a scout today, I’ve been trying out a couple different stores, seeing which has the stuff we get, which one we might stick with.”

“I’ve been coming here for years, I can vouch for this little supermarket.” You say easily, because it’s the truth, and…well it’s terrible but…if Charlie likes this grocery store then maybe you’ll see him again one day.

You can see the gears turning in his head as he shifts his weight onto his other foot, runs his hand through his hair again.

“What would you say to letting me be your shadow?” He asks, making you raise a playful eyebrow. He’s so charming, when he smiles at you and says so cooly, “I’m sure I can learn much about this store by sticking close to an expert like yourself.”

“I’d say I hope you’re in for a long browsing, I don’t like to rush my shopping.” You warn him playfully.

“That’s fine with me, I’ve got time.” Charlie says, surprising you, playing back.

That had been right at the beginning, you remember. You remember how he followed you around up and down the aisles, how he reached for things on shelves you couldn’t quite get to, how he introduced himself to the women behind the deli counter, accepted their samples gratefully and offered them to you.

You never could imagine that those grocery store visits would become something of tradition, you both going in your separate cars and meeting in secret, browsing the shelves right next to one another, talking about everything and nothing, and then parting ways as if you’d never met. You never would believe that he’s buy you pastries from the bakery and share them with you in the parking lot, your cars parked right next to one another, a stolen kiss in a back seat while he “helps you put the bags into your trunk.”

Looking back, you wonder if that bump in the store was a coincidence, or a planned means of getting your attention. Knowing what you know now, knowing how Charlie had begun to fall in love with you right from the moment he had a slice of that pie, maybe it wasn’t so farfetched of an idea.

* * *

But you didn’t know then, not back then. Back then you were just a neighbor, just a friend.

After the grocery store meeting, he stopped to talk to you whenever he saw you, wherever you were. You both came out to greet the mail-woman at the same time, and spent too long chatting with one another after she left.

As time went on, neighbors became friends. You and Charlie exchanged phone numbers for emergency contact purposes, went out for drinks every now and again. He introduced you to his friend circle, and you introduced him to yours, and eventually eventually eventually, when he fired his babysitter and was in dire need of someone to watch Henry, his first thought was of you.

He alone always picked Henry up, and you grew fond of the few stolen moments of company that you had managed when he did. He’s at your house one evening, alone, looking kind of miserable. Your heart aches for him, he and Nicole have been fighting more and more recently.

It’s not hard to hear, with them being so close. She screams at him sometimes, late into the night if Henry is having a sleepover with a friend and it out of the house. Those nights you always want to reach out to Charlie but you know it’s not your place.

You know better than to get entangled in a marriage squabble, know that’s just not your business to get involved in.

But it hurts, seeing him all alone like this, with red-rimmed eyes and a clenched jaw. It hurts knowing that he feels so bad, so down. You want to bring him back to happy, he deserves that you think, he deserves to be happy. He’s always trying so hard to take care of everyone else, tries so hard.

Who takes care of him?

You let him into the house when he knocks at your door, invite him to make himself comfortable if he’d like. He does, sits down at one of the little bar stools in the kitchen by the breakfast bar. He’s nearly got his head down against the table, holding himself up with only a shred of decency, not wanting to appear too pathetic in front of you.

“How was he?” Charlie asks, and his voice is raw, and your heart breaks.

“Wonderful.” You reply honestly, “I was worried he wouldn’t like me, but we did some painting and watched a movie and I let him pause it to ask questions every five minutes.”

Charlie sits up at that, a frown on his face.

“Painting? Shit I hope he didn’t make a mess or anything – ” He starts, but you shake your head, wave it off.

“Nah he was fine. I know how kids are, everything was washable. I gave him a big tshirt to wear over so he wouldn’t get it on his clothes or anything either.” You smile, trying to get him to relax for a minute. He didn’t have to be so pent up all the time, you think. Not when he’s with you, anyway.

“Thank you, Nicole would’ve had a fit.” Charlie groans, and you bite your tongue.

“I get it, the last thing you want is for nice stuff to be ruined.” You say, gesturing to the living room. “He’s fast asleep on the couch, I’ve just been working on some stuff in the meantime.”

“What sort of stuff?” Charlie perks up, suddenly looking a little less miserable. The curiosity in his eyes warms your heart.

Lately he’s been asking just as many questions as Henry had, wanting to know more about you, wanting to tell you about himself in return. You welcomed it, enjoyed the opportunity to grow closer, to become better friends. He was so smart, so well spoken – well, when he wasn’t picking his son up at midnight on a Wednesday after what was clearly an argument – that you found yourself drawn to him, to wanting to hear his opinions and to share yours in return.

It made you feel really good inside, that he wanted to hear them.

“I’m a writer.” You explain, suddenly realizing you never actually specified what it is that you do for a living. He knows you’re in the entertainment sphere, you’ve gone to the same parties with the same crowd of people, but you never divulged this little secret of yours, not that it was really a secret.

“TV?” Charlie asks, eyes sparkling.

“No, film.” You crinkle your nose playfully at the thought of writing for television, and he laughs.

“Holy shit, that’s pretty nice.” Charlie is impressed, and it feels good to impress him, feels good to know that he holds you to a high opinion. “Did you write anything I might’ve seen?”

“How do I know what you might’ve seen?” You tease with a raised eyebrow.

You walk out of the room and go down the hall to the den, where you’ve got all your awards on display on the mantle above the fireplace. 

“Is that – ” Charlie’s eyes widen, drawn to them, even more impressed.

You can’t help but bite at your lips and feel proud of yourself, of your work – proud that someone sees these awards and knows what they mean.

“Just a couple, nothing too fancy.” You try to play it off, looking at all the little gold statuettes with your name carved into brass plates. You shrug when he turns around to you, and you smile because he looks so enamored with you, so amazed, and he laughs when you wink, “No Oscars yet.”

“You’ll get there.” He nods, confident in that fact.

“I know.” You say and he laughs a little louder, appreciating your own confidence, your own lack of modesty. The laughter dies down to a soft smile in your direction, and you hate yourself for bringing her up, but you want to know how much time you have with him tonight, if you need to prepare yourself for his departure anytime soon by asking, “Where’s Nicole?”

His whole demeanor shifts, and the sag to his shoulders comes back a little bit. That wasn’t right, you think, spouses shouldn’t make one another feel like that.

“Oh she stayed at the party a little longer, I was tired and decided I’d come back home early.” He says through clenched teeth, trying his best to not get bitter and angry, trying not to look that way in front of you.

It’s okay, you think. He can be bitter or angry in front of you, everyone needs to let it out every once in a while.

“Do you…” You steel yourself for rejection, “Do you maybe want something to drink? A bite to eat or anything? Henry and I made cookies, I boxed them up so he could take them home but I don’t think he’d mind if we ate one or two.”

“I can’t say no to homemade cookies.” Charlie surprises you by accepting the offer, the invitation to stay longer, to stay with you. You smile, until he randomly stands up straight and fishes something out of his trouser pockets with an, “Oh, here.”

“Put that away I’m not taking your money.” You roll your eyes fondly at him when he tries to hand you a couple rolled up bills.

“Are you sure?” Charlie frowns, worried, nervous for a rejection of his own.

“Of course I’m sure, we’re friends aren’t we? I’m happy to help and watch Henry.” You say sincerely, pushing his hand away from yours.

The contact is electric, that little moment where your fingers grazed his knuckles. You try not to think about how it sends tingles up your arm, try not to think about how warm his skin was, how much you’d like to feel that warmth again.

“I can’t just dump my kid on you _and _have a cookie and not give you something back for that.” Charlie tries, but you shake your head.

“I mean it Charlie, really it’s okay.” You whisper, not so sure why you’re whispering, not really.

It’s just…he’s so handsome. And he’s here, and he’s caring, and he’s looking at you like you mean the world to him. You’ve only known him a couple months, but the way he looks at you it feels like you’ve known him your whole life. You know he’s probably like this with everyone, but well…you can’t help it if he makes you feel special.

The two of you stand in the dark of the den, in front of all your awards as the glint softly in the moonlight outside the window. He retracts his hand, but then…ever so slowly he reaches it out again. He grazes the back of his hand against the soft skin of your arm, a motion so gentle and slow that you wonder if you’re imagining it.

“I should probably take him home, huh.” Charlie whispers too, that touch so tentative, so afraid, worried you’ll throw him off of you.

But you won’t, you never would, and even as shame and guilt bubbles up in the pit of your stomach, even as his wedding ring reflects the same light as your awards, you don’t push him away. In fact, you take a daring step closer, one that has the scent of his cologne curling in your nostrils.

“You could stay a little while longer, I could show you what I’m working on if you’d like to see it. I bet you’d have tons of notes, big director that you are.” You say, trying to keep things normal, trying to keep them casual despite the way he so desperately wants to hold you in his arms.

“You’d show me?” Charlie asks, taking another step to you, and another, until your arms are winding around his shoulders, and his are tightening around your waist.

There’s no music playing, nothing but the sound of nighttime insects and distant travel in the city that never sleeps. There’s nothing but the sound of his heartbeat against your ear, and yet the two of you sway ever so slightly to the tune of one another’s breathing.

“If you’d like to see it.” You nod, letting your eyes close against his chest, embracing you and allowing yourself to embrace him back.

What was a friendly hug between friends, you justified it to yourself. Who better to give this man comfort than someone he trusted? You’d give him anything he asked, you know. You wonder if he knows, wonder if he’s aware of just how deep your feelings for him run, when he pinches your chin between his thumb and forefinger, tilts your head up and whispers,

“I’d love to.”

* * *

That had been a turning point, the first time he asked you to babysit Henry. Henry liked you so much that it was never a question of who would watch him, from then on. You got along so well with that kid, the two of you always had a good time. You were happy to pick him up from school on days where Charlie and Nicole were stuck in rehearsals, were glad to bring him to playgrounds and parks so he could play basketball with his friends after class.

Spending time with Henry brought you and Charlie even closer. You never planned for that, never planned for any of this to happen, but Henry’s approval of you made you even more wonderful in Charlie’s eyes. You respected that in a person, how Charlie was always so considerate of Henry’s thoughts, his opinions.

Charlie calls you up now randomly, asks to spend time together for no real reason other than because he wants to see you, wants to be in your company. You call him too, you text back and forth, you make plans with friends and also together alone, as friends.

He’s calling you now, one overcast morning, the phone vibrating on the night stand as you’re just waking up. You see his name on the caller-ID and grin, your stomach doing flips and flutters when you answer and put the receiver up to your ear. 

“(Y/N)? I know this is last minute but, I was wondering if you’d like to come out for coffee with me?” Charlie sounds so nervous in that way of his, and you can’t help but grin, thinking he’s so sweet how shy he gets when he talks to you.

“Morning Charlie! Of course I would, where were you thinking?” You’re already out of bed, walking into the closet to pull out something nice to wear.

“That little corner store, you know the one down the block? It’s not too big but it’s pretty empty right about now.” His voice is golden over the phone, deep but friendly, warm. “I figured we could write together.”

“That sounds like a good idea, I can bully you into finishing the draft finally.” You chuckle a little, and he laughs too, and his laugh only makes your stomach do those little flips some more.

“Please come bully me (Y/N), you’re my only hope.” He begs, and you’ve come to love this back and forth you’ve built with him, this playful teasing thing you do with one another.

“I’ll be there in ten, prepare to give up your lunch money.” You almost want to blow kisses into the phone, but you hold yourself back, hold yourself back from making a fool of yourself before you hang up.

He’s watching for you, when you step through the door of the little café. He stands like a gentleman, greets you with a warm hug and takes your jacket. It’s a chilly day outside, and you smile when you see a big mug of something hot waiting for you. 

“I got you your favorite -- I asked them what your normal order is I’m not a creep I swear.” Charlie says softly, and your heart blooms with affection for him.

“You could be a creep, I wouldn’t mind.” You say, and it’s not entirely a joke, not entirely a lie.

You sit down opposite him, and he sits down too, and you both smile at each other, clinking your mugs together and taking a nice hot sip. The drink warms you up, gets the chill from the walk out of your bones. When you both put the mugs down and open up your laptops, Charlie can’t stop looking at you.

He’s been doing that more and more, recently. Looking. You catch him sometimes, stealing glances at the mailbox or at parties, at work or with friends, when he picks up Henry from your place, when when when. It’s flattering, but…but it’s getting your hopes up, and that’s a dangerous game.

It’s dangerous because you want him so badly already, so badly as it is.

And you can’t have him.

Still, he’s looking, and the gaze has to mean something, it has to, doesn’t it?

“You look really nice.” He finally manages to say, gets the words out and only stumbles over them a little.

“Thanks, it has pockets!” You show off your little outfit, standing up slightly to give him a 360-degree view, knowing knowing knowing that he’s going to drink you in. “I just picked it up the other day, figured what better place to debut the look than the corner café?” You tease.

“And we’re all better for it, really.” He’s serious, and there’s something about that seriousness that makes your heart pound in your chest. He smiles at you, and you smile back, and when you sit down he turns his laptop around, pushes it towards you. “Would you look at what I’ve got?”

“How bad is it?” You arch a brow, and he slaps his face into his hand. You take a glance at the file, and see that it’s nearly one hundred pages shorter than it was the last time you got a glimpse of it. You gasp and swat at his arm. “What happened – I thought you were close to being done!”

“I need help, I’ve got writer’s block.” He groans into his hands.

“Then go call up your muse.” You regret the words as soon as you say them, even though you mean them lightly.

The reminder of Nicole stings the back of your throat.

But he looks at you, looks looks looks, with an expression that’s halfway between misery and love, and you’re trying desperately not to get your hopes up for something you _know _cannot happen – except, maybe it can.

Maybe it can, because he’s looking at you in the corner café, with yearning in his eyes, and his hand is reaching out towards you, the same sort of touch he gave you all that time ago on the first night when he came to pick Henry up, the back of his knuckles barely barely barely grazing yours.

Maybe it can, because he smiles at you gently, nervously, so warmly, and says,

“I did.”

* * *

Months pass, and with the change in seasons come more friendliness, more familiarity. It’s a sunny day, and you and Charlie have taken up a habit of walking through Times Square together when the weather is nice. There’s a big stand of bleachers outside the discount ticket window, and you put your sunglasses on, walk arm in arm around the block, settle near the bleachers and people-watch.

Nicole has been taking trips to Los Angeles more and more frequently recently. She’s been doing auditions for things there, television shows. You never liked television, but you can’t help but be glad for her absence. Charlie’s so much lighter whenever she’s gone; he laughs a little louder, smiles a little wider.

He spends more time with Henry, brings him to the theater often. Charlie’s telling you about it as you sit with your shoulders touching on the bleachers, telling you about how Henry got to go up on stage and pretend to be a prop for blocking purposes, telling you how much he loved it.

“I’d like to see one, a rehearsal.” You smile at him, genuinely curious what he gets up to when he’s in the zone. You and Charlie are at a point in your friendship where you can pout and be silly, be demanding with his time and affection. “If that’s allowed.”

And you’re lucky, because he’s demanding with yours in return. He pretends to think for a moment, tosses a piece of street-vendor popcorn at your face, cheers in surprise when you catch it in your mouth and eat it.

“It’s only allowed if you know the director.” Charlie says with mock-apology, shaking his head and shrugging, putting his hands on his hips.

“Hmm, I’ll have to shoot him a message then.” You play along, before the two of you break out into joyous laughter.

Nicole is out of town, away under the sunshine of her own on a coast you don’t care for, and you know that the troupe is working on something new and exciting and you want to share in that excitement with your friend, with Charlie.

He pulls the brim of your hat down your face and makes you laugh from it, makes you pinch at his thigh when you fix your outfit. Charlie beams at you, and you can’t help but think that if you were his wife, you’d kiss him on the cheek for such a display.

“There’s one tomorrow, you could come. I’d like you to come, will you?” He looks at you, looks so handsome with the sun on his hair, “It’ll probably be good for them, the troupe. They like to preform; it’ll make them better.”

“Send me the address to the theater, I’ll be over when I’m finished up with some meetings.” You nod, and he lights up like the fourth of July at the thought of you showing up.

The entire troupe is there to meet you the next day, when you arrive. They practically jump at the chance to shake your hand, to greet you hello, to give those fancy kisses on each cheek back and forth and back and forth. You shake, and greet, and kiss, feeling so welcomed and loved by this gaggle of theater lovers already.

You feel even more welcomed, even more loved, when Charlie materializes from somewhere and slides an arm around your waist, pulls you close to his side and looks down at you with a big smile.

“Everyone this is my best friend, (Y/N).” He introduces you to the troupe, and the words, the introduction is alone to have you beaming.

But what’s even better is their reaction to you, the way they all burst into excited chatter.

“So _you’re _the girl Charlie doesn’t shut up about.” One of them, a short balding man says a little louder above all the rest, making Charlie go bright red in the face.

“Aw you talk about me?” You bat your lashes at him, both feeling over the moon that you mean that much to him, and reveling in how he gets so flushed and shy and embarrassed.

“All the fuckin’ time, it’s nice to finally meet you.” That same man answers for Charlie, and the whole troupe exchanges knowing glances and smiles that have your cheeks aching from the grin.

“It’s nice to meet you guys too, I’m really honored to be here, I won’t be a distraction I promise.” You say, wanting to be polite and not to cause too much of a fuss.

“That ain’t something you’ve gotta tell _us_, honey.” One of the women winks, and Charlie makes a strangled sound that would have you laughing if you weren’t so enamored with him.

“Okay and that’s enough of that – places everyone.” Charlie cuts everyone off, claps his hands twice and pretends to shoo them all away. They keep looking over their shoulder at the two of you even though Charlie shields you from their gossiping gaze. He speaks softly with you, trying to get a grip on himself. “You can sit anywhere you’d like, get comfortable. I’ll be up there.”

And so you do, and up he goes, and it’s amazing.

You’ve spent enough time with Charlie to know that he can be commanding, that he can be present, can be in total control. He likes it that way, being in control, he’s so particular about the way he does things, you know. But to see it, to bare witness to this creative genius at work is breathtaking.

He knows just how to orchestrate this production so that it becomes less a series of events and more of a story, less a choreography of props and lighting and more of an immersive experience. He’s avant-garde in the best of ways, the most impactful of ways, even while in jeans and a button down.

You’re in awe of him, of the way he isn’t afraid to get up on the stage and illustrate just how he wants things done, isn’t afraid to execute his vision exactly how he sees it. And it’s such a process, all of it is, it’s a process that you’re a part of, because he’ll ask your opinion in the middle of it all, and that makes you feel warm, makes you feel good, knowing he values your opinion this much, respects it this much.

You’re honest with him, you tell him when things aren’t working and when they are, and he smiles at you.

By the end of the rehearsal, you’re so entranced with the performance and the story in front of you, that you can’t imagine spending your spare time anywhere else, anywhere other than here, than where Charlie is his most at-home.

And you try not to listen to them when they say it’s because of you, you try.

But it warms your heart when at the end of another rehearsal, he seeks you out, takes you to dinner, and the next day asks if you’ll do it all over again.

* * *

After the kiss, things change.

They change for the better, you’re thrilled to find. They change in the best ways. You’re in love with him, so in love with him, and he with you. You can say the words now, can say them out loud – and oh! Oh how freeing it is to say them and know the feeling is returned.

For so long, you thought that you were kidding yourself, delusional. You thought your feelings were one sided, but no, not they aren’t, the tingle on your lips is proof.

You kiss a lot more now, more than you could have ever dreamed. You kiss in secret meetings in the grocery store, in your car. You kiss in the kitchen when Charlie picks Henry up when you babysit him after school. You kiss in the café, the coffee shop and the theater.

You kiss when he brings you to hotels and fucks you blind, fucks you dumb late into the morning, in the pale light of dawn.

He’s happy now, you can tell. It’s beautiful seeing him like this, seeing him so free. You never really realized it before, but looking back, before confessing your feelings for one another, you don’t think you’ve ever seen him this happy. His eyes are brighter, his cheeks are pinker, he looks healthy – that glow of love eternal.

And you? You’re over the moon, completely and totally. You’re on cloud nine, your heart about to burst. Every morning you get with him is a dream, and every evening is a memory embedded into your brain forever more. He takes you out to these secret little hideaways, little old fashioned clubs where the music is soft and sweet and the neon lights glow red blue purple over your bodies as he slow dances with you.

You meet him in hole-in-the-wall bars, kiss and get handsy in a booth in the back where no one will disturb you, and he’ll take you to a hotel room that’s nearly on reserve for you at all times, to peel you out of your slinky dress and heels, to have sex until the sun rises over the New York City skyline.

You walk arm in arm down Time Square, but this time you rest your head on his shoulder when it starts to grow chilly, you snuggle up to him when you people-watch. He buys you gifts, all sorts of gifts, all the time. And you wear them, because you’re proud to, you’re proud of him.

It’s only a little while into the affair, when you find yourselves at the café working on a new script together. He slides a little piece of napkin across to you, really subtly, secretive.

You glance down at it and see that it’s a phone number written in his scrawling handwriting.

“Just for us.” He says with a shy smile.

“What is this?” You raise a brow, taking it and putting it into your purse for you to deal with later, when you’re not out in public.

“I…” He lowers his voice, licks his lips and pulls out a cell phone that you don’t recognize. It’s black, different from his white phone you’re used to seeing. He blushes as he unlocks it and shows that it’s empty, brand new. “I figured it wouldn’t be safe to use my regular phone for us, for this. So I got a new number, one that’s just for us.”

“You mean it?” You whisper, eyes widening. You know he does, you know, you just need to hear it.

“Yeah.” He swallows, runs a hand through his hair like the very first time you bumped into him when he was shy and nervous, “You…I love you, and I don’t want to hold myself back from talking to you. But if Nicole finds out – ”

“She won’t, we’ll be careful. We’re doing this the right way.” You stop that train of thought before it can spiral.

“Is there even a right way for this?” Charlie huffs out a little laugh, and smiles at you, glad that you aren’t going to kick him to the curb, feed him to the wolves.

You want to hold his hand, but you can’t – you can’t because then someone could see, and you don’t want anyone to see.

“Maybe not, but then we’ll just make our own rules, our own way.” You say, keeping your hand to yourself, keeping your kisses to yourself too, knowing that once you go back to your house, before Nicole or Henry come home, you’ll have your fill of one another. “She won’t find out.”

“Will you call me, text me when you need me?” Charlie asks, and you smile softly.

“Yes, as long as you do the same when you need me, I don’t want you feeling alone, left out to dry the way she leaves you. I’m always here for you, always.” You nod, sighing happily, so so so in love.

He gets frustrated then, a frustration which has been cropping up more and more, the more serious you two get about each other. His jaw clenches and his eyes start to water and you do cover his hand with your own then, public be damned, wandering eyes be damned too.

“I’m here for you, I want – fuck (Y/N), I want to be here for you more than I am. One day, when things settle down after the run of the show, I’m going to break things off with her and be with you.” He says with great restraint so he doesn’t shout out about it all.

“I know, it’s okay, I know.” You say, letting your thumb rub soothing circles on the back of his hand. “We take it one day at a time.”

* * *

He’s away in California, for the second time that month. You know it’s driving him crazy, making him insane. He doesn’t know why they insist so much of the trial has to be there, when he lives in New York, when Henry has always lived in New York. Even when Nicole fucked off for six months, Henry stayed in New York.

But now Henry is in California with his mother, a mother who decided to show her face once again after abandoning her family, a mother who has come back with a vengeance that isn’t deserved, hasn’t been earned.

And Charlie is in California too, attempting to furnish a very small apartment he rented so he doesn’t have to keep paying for expensive Los Angeles hotels. He’s all the way in California, and he’s pissed off, frustrated for too many reasons.

He’s got this apartment now in addition to the house he bought, bought with _fuck you _money. He knew it was a good way to impress the judge, the gorgeous home. Ironically, you’re furnishing the home while he’s away in California, getting it ready for him and Henry to come back and live in.

He’s worried, nervous that the case is going to end badly, that he’s going to lose, and he’s freaking out about the whole thing with you on video chat as he holds up different drawings and paintings that Henry did, trying to figure out which one to put up on the walls.

“Fuck I wish you were here.” He grumbles and groans, “I hate this, I’m not good at this kind of shit.”

You’re laying on his bed, a bed which you’ve come to think of as _your _bed, because you’ve been sleeping here while you get it prepared for them. You’ve already done the living room and kitchen, and just finished the master bedroom -- you’ve shown him everything and he loves it, he keeps complaining how much nicer everything would look if you were there, how much better he’d feel.

“I know honey, but let me see the options again.” You say from the bed, lounging in pajamas because of the time difference.

Charlie holds up two paintings, both of them ones that you all did together as a family, one rainy night when the weather was too gloomy for anything else. One is a beautiful landscape in crayon and marker, the other is what you can only assume is a stick-figure family portrait that has always made you smile.

“I want to get them framed, should I just get them both framed?” Charlie is too frustrated to even care about the portrait, too worried. He needs this to go well, you know, he knows you know.

“Can you hold up the computer?” You ask, disregarding the paintings for a minute, “Like, let me see the whole room, I need to visualize.”

He does so quickly, and gives you a tour of the space.

It’s small, and it’s bland, and you’re already pulling up interior design websites, trying to help him.

“Please honey I’m hopeless.” He complains.

“Shut up no you’re not, you just need some…direction.” You say, knowing it’ll make him roll his eyes at you.

He turns the computer back around so you can see his face, and despite himself, he’s got a big incredulous grin he’s fighting.

“You think you’re so funny.” Charlie shakes his head, fond and in love.

“You’re laughing, aren’t you?” You tease back.

He sets the computer down and not for the first time during this whole shitshow, your heart aches for him. He looks so out of place there, in Los Angeles. This isn’t the city for him, no way. He hates spending time there, hates that he has to spend time away from you.

Things had been so good, hadn’t they? You’d been doing the best you could together, the best you could to try and build something new, the best you could to build a family.

And she just had to ruin it.

“I wish you were here.” Charlie says for the thousandth time, and for the thousandth time you wish you could reach through the computer screen and kiss him, could put your head on his shoulder and let him hold you, hold him yourself.

“You’ll be home to me soon.” You say, and those words give him the strength he needs to carry on through it all, because soon, soon he’ll be home to you – home in New York, yes.

But also home in your heart. 

* * *

You spot him, leaving the courthouse then. It’s across the street, and so he’s a little farther away than you’d like him, but you recognize his height and stature anywhere. You’d recognize him anywhere, and there he is.

You’re quick to pack up your stuff, your laptop that’s nearly untouched, the cup of coffee that you still never refilled. The nervousness courses through you so badly that your hands shake when you try and bring the little cup and saucer over to the dish return cart.

You look both ways before crossing the street, before walking as quickly as you can to him, begging begging begging for good news.

Charlie’s been through so much, too much. He needs this, needs good news.

But when you see him, he doesn’t say anything, nothing at all. There’s a wet sheen to his eyes, and your stomach drops, it twists and churns in your gut and you think you’re going to be sick, from the way he holds back his tears.

He reaches out for your hand in utter silence, and you take it without any hesitation. You can feel how clammy his palms are, how they tremble, how they shake.

Walking to the parking lo, your vision nearly goes spotty with anxiety. He opens your door for you and closes it after you when you’re safely inside. Your heart hammers in your chest as you force yourself to hold back the thousand questions that you have. You don’t want to overwhelm him, not when he’s so overwhelmed already. You buckle your seat belt and wait, wait for him to say something first.

It isn’t until he’s at a red light, when he’s got a white-knuckle grip on the steering wheel, that he startles you with his voice.

“Will you move in?” He asks, throat dry as he stares straight ahead, wills himself not to cry. “Officially, I’m asking you to move in.”

“Yes.” You say right away, and your chin is already wobbling, your throat already tightening for him.

You feel like your heart is breaking, and maybe it is. Maybe it is, with this, with how everything has been shattered, how everything is now going to change.

“Thank you.” He whispers, and his voice cracks and you turn to face him then, you can’t help it, can’t help but sit in the silence anymore.

“Charlie…” You shake your head, speechless. You’re speechless, as the light turns green and he blinks away hot tears that spill down his cheeks.

“It’s – we’re. I’m.” He blinks and blinks and blinks, and his breath comes in faster and faster as he stutters over his words, “We’re going to be okay, aren’t we? Won’t we? I – he just – the judge – ”

“Pull over.” You know he must be stunned, he must be shocked beyond belief, because he’s in a bit of a daze, and one that you know is dangerous.

The moment Charlie finds a random shopping center to pull into and puts the car in park, you’re unfastening your seat belt and racing out of the car, opening up the driver side and pulling him out, pulling him into your arms.

He holds you tightly in the parking lot and bursts into sobs, shoulder shaking hard around you. You cry and cry and cry, hyperventilating against one another with incoherent mumblings of _I’m so sorry _and _she won, she won she won she won she’s taking him away they’re taking him away from us. _

“Maybe he’ll do college on the east coast.” He whispers, an echo of words that a nicer lawyer once told him, back when this first started to get messy, and you crush him to your chest.

You feel sick, you feel like this has to be some kind of cruel twist of fate, like this has to be a mistake – it has to be, it just has to be.

But Charlie is holding you too tightly for you to do anything else but hold him back.

You cry, lean on each other for support, wondering and fearing for an uncertain future.

But one thing is for sure, even though your hearts are crushed and the damage has been done, you’ll just have to do as you’ve always done, and take one day at a time.

For now, it’s enough to hold onto one another there in the parking lot, enough to be together in your grief and devastation.

And as Charlie clings to you like a life support out in the ocean, an anchor, a buoy out at sea, there are no words to offer him other than an _I love you, _and even those hurt, even those break your heart.

_If I should lose you, the stars would fall from the skies_

_If I should lose you, the leaves would wither and die_

_The birds in May time would sing a lonely refrain_

_And I would wander around hating the sound of rain_

_With you beside me, no wind in winter would blow_

_With you beside me, a rose would bloom in the snow_

_I gave you my love but I was living a dream_

_And living would seem in vain if I lost you_


	11. Chapter 11

_I've never been in love before  
Now all at once it's you  
It's you forever more_

_I've never been in love before  
I thought my heart was safe  
I thought I knew the score_

He doesn’t know how to do it, how to tell him. He doesn’t have the words. All those years writing, all the time spent on his scripts, and he doesn’t have the words. Charlie stares into his coffee, watches the creamer swirl. It’s a beautiful day outside, and that hurts somehow, hurts more than it would if it were raining. At least if it were raining, he could feel like the world cries along with him, but the sunshine through the curtains you picked out and hung up – that hurts.

He’s got to tell Henry, he knows that ever minute longer he waits, the harsher the blow will be. But he’s not got the words for it, how could he, when he never dreamed a day like this would come?

That’s a lie maybe, maybe he did dream of it.

But those don’t count. The nightmares…nightmares don’t count.

You’re silent at the breakfast table, doing your best not to cry. Henry can tell something’s wrong, of course he can, he’s a smart kid. He can tell, and it breaks Charlie’s heart.

Can a heart break if it’s already broken?

Charlie looks to you for strength, for something, he doesn’t know. Part of him wishes you could jump in and deliver the news instead of him. You’re so good at making things sound better than they are, you’re good at the phrasing. Charlie’s never been that good at it, but he knows this is something he has to do himself – he’s no coward, not like Nicole.

Still, Charlie looks to you, and you look back at him with wet eyes, give him a little nod. That nod is all it takes, and he can feel his shoulders squaring up a little more, can feel the cold drip of dread in his stomach a little fainter. 

“I was thinking, what if you and me skip out today and go have fun at the park, Henry?” He tries to be nonchalant about it, bites into his toast and sips his coffee.

He desperately wants to hold your hand, but he’s afraid he’ll shake too much and rattle your bones. 

“You mean like I don’t have to go to school?” Henry cocks his head and gives a confused frown. Henry’s not missed a single day of school the entire time Charlie’s been taking care of him.

“Yeah, how does that sound?” Charlie tries to smile, but he’s not so sure it works.

“Won’t I get in trouble?” Henry looks at him, looks at you.

“No, I’ll call you in, it’ll be okay.” You do smile, with a little nod of your head that Charlie envies.

“Okay.” He smiles back, and Charlie tries very hard not to imagine it as the last smile he gets to see for however many months it’ll be until he gets his son back home again.

* * *

The park is filled with people, bustling with activity. Henry does most of the talking, which Charlie doesn’t mind. He talks about things at school, talks about the science fair. He talks about his friends and what he dreamt about last night, asks questions that he thought up while watching that documentary about the deep sea with you. Charlie listens, he’s been spending a lot more time listening lately. Listens and tries his best to answer the questions, he tries.

There are dogs to be pet, and kites to be flown, and birds to feed. Charlie buys him a big soft pretzel and tries not to cry when Henry offers him the bigger piece. He can’t stop thinking about everything he’s going to miss out on, all the milestones and all the memories that’ll be made without him.

He can’t say it out loud, he can’t, but it’s like he’s not going to really ever be his parent again, not like this, not the way they’ve set it up. Charlie’s hands sweat, and he blames it on the sunshine, blames it on the warmth of the day.

“Hey Henry?” Charlie cuts Henry off right in the middle of a sentence, and he feels bad that he wasn’t listening, but Henry was talking with his mouth full anyway.

“Yeah dad?” Henry chews and swallows, and his eyes are so wide, and Charlie wants to scream.

“I um.” He doesn’t scream, but his voice comes out strangled, like he’s holding it back, like he’s holding so much back. “Well I’ve got something to tell you. Here why don’t…why don’t we go over here and sit down.”

Charlie leads his son over to an empty bench a little bit away from people. He doesn’t want an audience for this, doesn’t want any prying eyes for his tears. Henry goes hesitantly, he knows something is wrong, the other shoe has dropped.

“Did I do somethi—” Henry starts, and Charlie’s eyes well up immediately, because the last thing he ever wants is for Henry to think this is his fault.

“No, no you didn’t do anything.” He says straight away, doesn’t even let Henry get the thought out, wanting to stop that right in its tracks. He takes a deep breath, wants a cigarette. He won’t smoke in front of Henry, he won’t. But his hands shake and sweat and he can’t face his son, not really. He tries, tries to find the words. “You…you’ve been happy that Mom’s back, right?”

“Yeah.” Henry replies softly, settles down on the bench next to his dad, puts the soft pretzel in his lap, wrapped up nicely in the little paper sleeve in came with.

“That’s good, that’s um.” Charlie runs a hand through his hair, an old nervous habit that’s come back as he scratches at the back of his scalp with a shuddering sigh. “That’s good. Well, you know, ever since Mom came back, we’ve been in a big game of tug and war, because we both love you so much and we both want you to be with us all the time.”

“Yeah, the court.” Henry nods, and Charlie hates this, hates himself, hates Nicole, hates the world, because his son shouldn’t be so resigned to it, to this.

“Mhm, and um, well.” He tries, chews his cheek, “We asked the court to decide for us, because they – the judge – well he’s a very smart man.”

“Smarter than you?” Henry scoffs, as if in disbelief.

“Yeah.” Charlie can feel his chin wobble, but he looks up to the sky, wills his tears to just trickle back down into his head, begs them not to fall yet, not yet, not in front of his son. “Yeah, smarter than me. And he decided that it would, it’d be best – it’d be smartest, for you to live with Mom from now on.”

He’s reminded of a long time ago, staring up at the sky like this.

Once upon a time, he would hide away in a theater full of ghosts, would demand from them the reasons why they mocked him so.

Once upon a time he would blind himself with delusions of victory, and now it’s all he can do but hold back the crushing screams of defeat.

Maybe they always knew it would end up like this, privy to the grand plan of his life.

Once upon a time he wished his life were a comedy, and maybe it was. Maybe it was, but someone else was laughing.

“I don’t understand.” Henry says, and Charlie closes his eyes, because the sadness and confusion in his voice hurts more than the sunshine which soaks into his skin.

“Mom gave her side of the argument, and I gave mine, and in the end, the judge liked her side better. So you’re going to go live with her from now on, over in California. That’s going to be fun, wont it? You love the beaches there.” He explains, sighing a little and putting his hands in his pockets, looking at his son.

“But…” Henry tries to come up with words of his own.

“And I’m really lucky, because the judge said that for a whole month over the summer you get to come back to New York, and I get to spend the holidays with you, and – ” Charlie tries to fill the silence with reassurances, reassurances which feel like kicks to the chest.

“Wait but, where am I going to sleep?” Henry cuts him off, eyes wide, starting to panic. “Where’s my bed going to be?”

“You’ll sleep in your bed at Mom’s.” Charlie answers, wanting to calm him, wanting but knowing that he can’t, that there’s no easy way to say any of this, no easy way to make it hurt less. “In California.”

“…But what about my legos and and -- and my clothes?” Henry shakes his head, trips over his tongue, rushes to try and understand.

“They’ll be in California too. And you know what, Mom is so excited that she said she’s going to buy you all new clothes and legos, and action figures.” Charlie answers, gives a smile that his son isn’t buying, not one bit.

“Where will you be?” Henry asks, voice so small, so sad, chin wobbling of his own.

“I…” Charlie has to force the words out. The come as a whisper, but it still feels loud, sounds like a shout in his head, a hoarse crying yell against his brain, even though the can barely move his lips. “I’m going to stay here, Henry. I have to stay here.”

“And (Y/N)?” Henry’s crying now, little tears sliding down his cheeks. He shoves his hand against his eyes, trying to get a grip, and Charlie doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know what to say, because his tears are falling too, each one landing with a deafening slam onto the pavement below, a thousand thunderstorms in each tear.

“She has to stay here too.” Charlie has a rock in his throat, and he can’t look at him, has to look down at the way his hands are curled into anxious fists in his pockets. “But you know what, we can come and visit you and you can show us all – all the new fun things about Los Angeles.”

“What if I don’t like it, can I come back home?” Henry hiccups, “Do I get to come back?”

“What do you mean ‘if you don’t like it’, you’re going to have a great time! Mom loves you so much and, and you’re, well you’re going to have a great time, I just know it.” Charlie tries tries tries, but he fails. Maybe he’s been failing this whole time, he doesn’t know. He doesn’t know anything anymore.

“B-but if you’re not going to be there who is going to read me my bedtime story or help me with my reading or make me tea or – ” Henry’s crying hard now.

“C’mere, come here.” Charlie can’t hold back anymore, he wraps his son up in his arms, pulls him into his lap and holds him tight. Henry sobs into his neck, little arms crushing Charlie’s shoulders. Charlie rocks him back and forth, cries into his hair as he rubs soothing circles on his back. “It’s going to be okay. We’re gonna be okay.”

He doesn’t know if it’s the truth, but he has to believe it, has to believe the words.

“When do I have to go?” Henry’s muffled from where he won’t pry his face away from the crook of Charlie’s neck, little frame shaking, breaking Charlie’s heart.

“She’s going to pick you up tonight. So we have the whole day to spend together and pack up your most favorite things so that you’ll have them for California.” Charlie wants to lie and say never, but the truth is here, and the truth hurts, and Henry cries.

Charlie holds him, avoids the uncomfortable stares of park-goers on bicycles, glares up at the sky, angry and devastated and exhausted all at once. He doesn’t have much more to give, doesn’t know what more the world wants from him. It’s taken so much already, too much.

“Dad?” Henry asks, pulling away and smearing his face on his shirt-sleeve, a button down that matches one of Charlie’s favorites.

“Yeah honey?” Charlie pulls a napkin out of his pocket that he took from the pretzel vendor, offers it to his son.

“If you ever get lonely, just – just know you can call me, okay? I’ll always pick up.” Henry’s chin wobbles again, but the tears have stopped for the time being, and despite it all, Charlie smiles.

“Don’t say that, I’ll call you every day.” He teases, trying trying trying to lighten the mood.

Despite it all, Henry smiles back.

_But this is wine  
It's all too strange and strong  
I'm full of foolish song  
And out my song must pour_

_So please forgive this helpless haze I'm in  
I've really never been  
In love before_

Charlie and Henry spend the rest of the day packing. It’s hard, hard trying to think of everything he’ll need, everything he wants. He’s got his big suitcase and his carry-on to pack his life into, and something about that seems like the saddest part.

You know you’ll ship over anything else he wants, whatever else he can think of that he can’t fit…but part of you wants to keep it here, keep it as some incentive for him to come back. If everything he loves is over in California, what if he forgets all about New York entirely?

You shake the thought from your head, it’s silly to think. A small voice in your head tells you it was silly to think that this could ever work to begin with.

You shake _that _thought from your head too, fiercely optimistic. Charlie was devastated, Henry is nearly non-verbal from the weight of the news, you have to be the optimistic one, you have to be. If you start to be crushed now, who would be there to pull them up from their despair?

You’re tidying up the already tidy house, just to have something to do while Henry and Charlie pack up the pieces of his life here. It’s a big house, a couple thousand square feet larger than the one in the old neighborhood, so there’s plenty to do. You arrange and rearrange cushions on the couch, move vases filled with flowers from one surface to another. You open and close curtains, and eventually find yourself leaning up against the island in the kitchen, arms folded onto the granite as you rest your head on the counter.

You close your eyes and breathe, try not to think of all the nights you spent with them together, as a family. This house was relatively new to you all, only two months or so. But the six months before that, that was time, real time spent together. Dinners and game nights, homework and projects, trips to the city and the park, the theater and the movies. You think about the time he scraped his knee trying to roller skate in the driveway, think about how he came to you with tears in his eyes about how much it stung, how you made him cookies to help with the bravery.

You think about how proud Charlie always is of him, all the things tacked up onto the fridge and hung up in frames on the wall. Charlie was going to find someone to sublet the apartment in Los Angeles, and you knew that as soon as that happened there’d be more art up on the walls, more memories of a son taken away.

The doorbell rings, shaking you from your thoughts, and you sigh. Charlie is still upstairs, so you collect yourself, put on your best brave face, and go through the empty halls of the house, feet carrying you to the front door. 

“You’re here.” Nicole says, confused and surprised, when you open the door.

There’s a man standing at the end of the driveway near the car, the same man who showed up to testify in court on her behalf. You try not to jump to conclusions, because you’d be a hypocrite for being angry that Nicole already moved on so quickly.

“Yeah, I’ve been here for a little bit.” You say coolly, opening the door a little wider for her to step in.

“Doing what?” She asks, leaving her shoes on, tracking footprints on the freshly polished tile.

“Cleaning up the mess you left behind.” You say calmly as you close the door so the air conditioning doesn’t spill out into the neighborhood, not caring to invite the mystery man in. He can stay by the car, you don’t want him in the house.

Nicole is stunned by your disposition as she follows you into the house. You make sure to bring her through the living room, the den, make sure she sees how nice it is, how big and cozy. You stop at the dining room, and she’s impressed by it – it’s hard not to be.

“How can you be on his side?” Nicole asks, looking vaguely offended at the way you offer a plate of sliced cheese and crackers. That doesn’t stop her from taking one, she talks with her mouth full, “After everything he’s done to me and to Henry?”

You blink, try your best not to let your eyebrows shoot up too dramatically.

“What has he done, Nicole?” You ask, resigned, not wanting to let her play the victim anymore. It’s exhausting, and you don’t have the energy for it.

It’s a rhetorical question, but Nicole answers it anyway, and you resist the urge to roll your eyes. She only ever really likes to hear the sound of her own voice, you know, you shouldn’t be surprised. 

“He never listened to me, he only ever did the things he wanted to do! He never once asked me about my day, or recognized my needs as my own. For years I stood by and let him walk all over me, and he had no problem doing it!” She immediately launches into the same argument she’s been touting for two months, and you very carefully pick up a cracker and bite it into two, a loud snap that makes her startle.

“You call him selfish, but all I’m hearing is you were comfortable enough with the life you chose until you grew bored of it. How is a person supposed to know how you’re feeling unless you tell them? You never told him, never once gave him any inkling that something was wrong until you kicked him to the couch.” You keep your voice low, calm. It wouldn’t do to get riled, not today. There’s too much tension, you don’t need everyone shouting on top of it.

“I – ” She starts, but you really don’t want to hear it.

“Who was it that bailed on couples therapy?” You ask, eyes cold and hard.

“That’s – ” She shakes her head.

“Who was it that went around talking to everyone about your problems but the person giving you grief in the first place?” You scoop a cracker into some soft brie, not bothering to look at her.

“Don’t – ” Nicole tries to get a word in, but you don’t let her. She’s done so much talking, so much monologuing. A true actress.

“Who was it that got a lawyer first when you both agreed to handle it without them?” Your hand grips the edge of the counter. “Who was it that blindsided him with terms and conditions he had no fucking clue that he was getting himself into? Who was it that bullied him into crying so hard the blood vessels in his eyes bruised? Who was it that up and fucking left her son in the middle of the night? You may have won over the judge, but don’t you dare pretend for one second that you’re the good guy here.”

You stare at one another, and her eyes are wide.

Her silence is deafening in the quiet of the room.

Eventually, a noise from the stairs snaps you both back to reality, and Nicole has the decency to look ashamed, to cast her eyes down to where her hands are clasped in her lap.

“I thought we were friends.” She says quietly, but the guilt trip doesn’t work.

“You thought wrong.” You hear heavy footsteps coming into the kitchen, so you bite the inside of your cheek and turn away from her. “Now let me get you something to drink. You must be so parched from all those crocodile tears.”

Charlie watches you leave to go towards the kitchen, and he’s frowning, because he’s never seen you with such a scowl on your face. He stands there and lets his gaze trail over your body, soaks up some of your self control and steps into the dining room.

She looks good, Nicole. Tanned, blonde. California has been good to her, he knows.

Part of him hates her for it, hates how she’s put him through absolute hell while she’s sunbathing by a pool somewhere. Part of him thinks he never should have let her go, never should have let her run away the way she did. He should have tried harder to get her to stay and listen, maybe they could have worked out a better divorce situation, Charlie could have had more of a say.

But then he thinks of you, and how these past few months have been absolute hell but at the very least, at the absolute very least he had you. He’ll never say it out loud, but he’s almost glad that she fucked his life up so dramatically, because he got to have that time with you.

“Hi Charlie.” Nicole says, and it feels strange, hearing his name come out of her mouth without venom for once.

“Hi.” Is all he can muster up in return.

“Charlie I’m sorry…” Nicole whispers, eyes welling up, but Charlie’s too tired to even really deal.

“He’s all packed up and ready to go.” He begins to turn away, to leave her standing there and get his son, when he feels her hand on his arm.

“I -- Can I talk to you for a second, outside?” She asks when he looks at her with a frown.

In between the dining room and the kitchen there’s a sliding glass door that leads to a little patio in the backyard, and he opens it, lets her pass through it first like a gentleman he doesn’t really want to be. Nicole looks around, doesn’t sit. They both sort of stand there, arms crossed over their chests, as Charlie waits for her to say something.

“It’s a um.” Nicole blinks, “It’s a beautiful home.”

“Thanks.” Charlie replies dryly. He wants a cigarette, desperately, but something about smoking in front of Nicole feels like defeat.

He’s already lost so much, so much pride, so much of his happiness, he doesn’t need to lost that bit of composure too.

Nicole looks down at her shoes, nice sandals that Charlie can just picture walking through sand.

“You know I came here with a whole speech prepared and now I don’t’ know what to say.” She says softly, and Charlie sighs.

“You can give the speech, I’ll listen.” He says sincerely. He figures he owes her this, an entire marriage of selfishness, he can give her this.

“I…” Nicole starts, walks around a little bit in that way she does, talks and walks, gestures with her hands. “You know I’ve been working very hard, to make something of myself, these last few months. Something that Henry could be proud of, something that _I_ could be proud of. I got the TV gig, and I – I’m directing a couple projects here and there, nothing major, but. But it feels good, to be my own person, and I thought how good would it be, for Henry to see me take control of my own life?”

She looks at him, and he looks back, and she takes a deep breath. Something deep inside Charlie wants to comfort her. He’s reminded of how young they were, when all this started, how young and in love they were, once upon a time.

Now look at them.

“And I came here to take him home with me, because I believe he belongs with me. But…” She covers her mouth with her hand, a habit she always had so people wouldn’t see her when she’s crying for real. Charlie watches, listens, doesn’t interrupt her, not this time. “But then I look at the home you’ve made here for him, I see all his stuff and the art on the walls, and I just…Charlie, I never wanted to hurt you, or Henry. I never wanted to hurt you. But I did. Remember what you said in court? You built a life here with him, and maybe it wasn’t perfect but it was yours, and…”

She cries for real, and Charlie puts everything aside for a moment, and hugs his ex-wife. She smells like someone else’s cologne, and he’s almost glad for it, glad that she’s got someone to hold her, because this is the last time he ever will, he’s decided.

“I love him so much.” Nicole’s shoulders shake in Charlie’s embrace, and Charlie…Charlie doesn’t dare hope, doesn’t dare get his hopes up because they’ve been crushed so many times, crushed by her, by the world.

“I know.” His heart is thrumming in his chest, and they hold onto each other while she cries.

“I’m going back to California tonight.” She whispers, and Charlie’s knees almost give out when he strains to hear the words, “Just me.”

“Just you?” He repeats, because he can’t believe it, can’t believe his fucking ears, he must be hallucinating, must be dreaming, must be --

“I’m not taking him.” Nicole says, plain and clear, wrapped up in his arms, hot tears stinging his neck.

Charlie squeezes her so tight that he’s almost afraid of breaking her, but he can’t help it. He might be sick, just from the sheer relief of the sentiment, of the words. They’re real, real words that she’s just said, and he knows she means them. His eyes are closed and he sees stars dancing behind his eyelids, he’s dizzy, he might just pass out, might just faint from the news.

The sun shines bright and golden, coats the world in a buttery hue that warms Charlie straight to his bones. You were right, you were always right. Even when he doubted you for a moment, when the judge banged his fucking gavel and the verdict fell upon deaf ears, blind and numb from the shock and the pain, even then you were right.

“Do you want to go talk to him? He’s upstairs in his room.” Charlie says, almost afraid to let her go now, to destroy the spell.

But she steps out of his hold, wipes her face and nods, looks up at him. She doesn’t look like she’s going to change her mind, looks resolute, looks resigned. He’s been so concerned about how hard this whole thing has been for him, but this is the first time he sees that maybe, even though she did this to him, maybe it was hard for her too.

“Thank you.” Nicole gathers herself together, gets a grip.

Charlie opens the sliding glass door, lets her step through it once again.

“First door on the right.” He tells her, and she nods, walks away. She doesn’t get too far though, not until he’s calling her name, “Nicole?”

“Yeah?” She stops in her tracks, looks back at him, and he can’t help but feel grateful, can’t help but feel sorry, for the whole thing. The whole thing.

“I never wanted to hurt you either.” He says softly, the deep rooted truth of it all expressed with that one sentence.

Nicole smiles, and then she’s up the stairs, disappearing down the hallway to go say goodbye.

He goes on a hunt for you, immediately. Seeks you out, searches for you in the house. He finds you in the kitchen, back against the fridge with your hands over your mouth, relief having crashed through you too. He collects you into his arms and picks you up, swings you around and around until you’re stifling wet laughter, until you’re both dizzy dizzy dizzy.

“(Y/N), did you hear – ” Charlie’s hands shake, and this time it’s for an altogether different reason, this time it’s out of sheer joy, sheer excitement. It feels like when he came home to you to tell you about the MacArthur grant, that sheer disbelief that he could be so lucky.

“Charlie I’m, fuck I’m so happy for you.” You hold onto him, not wanting any space between your bodies, hearts beating together, beating in time. “I love you, I love you.” You say it over and over again, a grin on your face so beaming that Charlie’s blind to anything else.

“Kiss me?” He puts you down and smooths his hands over your cheeks, rubs your noses together, smiling so wide that his cheeks hurt, “Nothing matters now, kiss me.”

And when you press your lips up against his, when your tears stain each other’s faces, happy tears filled with joy, with relief, with the taste of salt and victory, he can’t help but think how lucky he must be.

How lucky, to have found someone that he can share this with so deeply, someone who understands him so completely? Someone who loves him?

Because you do, you love him, and he loves you right back, with his heart, body, mind and soul.

_But this is wine  
It's all too strange and strong  
I'm full of foolish song  
And out my song must pour_

_So please forgive this helpless haze I'm in_  
I've really never been  
In love before

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for coming on this emotional rollercoaster with me, I hope you enjoyed it, and I'm sending you all my love <3


End file.
